BD 



FATE MID JUSTIC 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



GfrrTji Oqiijrigfjt $o- 

Shelf ..ft. 5±2 (» 
■ Wfr 



IMTED STATES OF AMERICA. 




Justice must be- 
in the Heavens and on Earths. 



Yours, 



J /r f @foe&enc/a??^et. 



PREFACE OF THE TRANSLATOR. 



In translating this most interesting work, I have fre- 
quently adhered even to the idioms peculiar to the language 
of the author. This has become more necessary, as it 
claims to be a revelation. The book, I trust, will pass on its 
own merit. The argument has many things iu its favor. 
Every man must judge for himself, how near it approaches 
his own personal consciousness. Thoroughly convinced of 
the sincerity of the author, I did not hesitate for a moment 
to undertake the work offered. May the book start on its 
helpful mission to a doubting humanity. 



h 






FATE AND JUSTICE 



OR, 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING, 



AND THE 



Philosopher's Pressing Questions 



BY 



EMIL ULRICH WIESENDANGER, 
Comanche, Texas. 



TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN, BY N. SHULTZ. 

(Copyrighted November 13, 18^3.) 

<9 



Fob Sale bt tbe autbob, at Comancbe. Texas 






SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS: 

GUESSAZ * FERLET, EXPERT PRINTERS. 

!895 






iNTrr^ODUOTriON. 



What is there that troubles the heart of inan more than 
the thought: God. The thought, Live I, and what shall be- 
come of me? The thought, Whence and why have I come 
into being? 

Judging from external appearances, selfishness and the 
desire for wealth are man's greatest stumbling blocks; but 
in his innermost being there is something to disturb his 
peace, and. uncalled, the above thoughts, like a flash, cross 
his every-day path. As the years of man advance, as civili- 
zation widens and science developes, so grows and ripens the 
longing of the Soul to understand itself and its future destiny. 

In the advanced minds of our century there has grown 
an earnest desire to know, and not merely to believe. No 
longer do the attainments of natural science as well as those 
of experience of the individual or of our social life permit 
the acceptance of mere traditional belief. To know is the 
passport of modern man. 

Blind belief is folly, while study and research after the 
cause of all phenomena, as soon as found, ceases to be mere 
belief and becomes knowledge. In spite of the high standard 
of modern science, the great mass of humanity is still living 
in spiritual discontent and longs for a solution of the troub- 
ling something, of which the philosophy of our day has been 
unable to give a satisfactory answer. 

It is discouraging indeed to consider our inability to 
solve the problem of our every-day life, to truly understand 
the cause of our fate, our struggle, and then to adjust these 
with the all-righteousness of God; to consider our inability 



ever to reach positive knowledge as to whether or not we 
have a soul, whether we are to live or to be annihilated, 
whence and whither our destiny, and why all our sufferings, 
disappointments and tears': 

Why. asks the thoughtful spirit, is all this mass of expe- 
rience, of knowledge? Why this struggle after moral pro- 
gress, through untold sufferings and endless labor in gaining 
the greatest perfection in life and then to be no more? Why 
be. merely to spend a miserable journey? Why are all these 
human inequalities? Why fate, lot. or terrible chance, all 
in such a brief period of existence? 

All these and other questions have not been answered up 
till the present day. although they have baffled the thinking 
minds of all ages. These are the questions which shall be 
brought forth in the light of truth in the present work — a so- 
lution to the question of lrfe. 

THE AUTHOR. 



FATE AM) JUSTICE; OH 



F^^RTT I. 



1. Where in the ranks of humanity can we find a 
man who, having considered universal justice in the 
light in which it presents itself to the best understand- 
ing, can claim for himself to comprehend the same? 
L e. the justice which stands before God? Or, in bet- 
ter words, who can consider himself or his life well 
balanced between fate and being? I believe this 
branch of study to be the least understood, the least 
considered and yet the greatest and the foundation of 
all human philosophy. 

I might ask: If justice is the foundation of all' 
spiritual knowledge, why has it not been perceived or 
discovered by our most philosophic thinkers? The 
contents of this book will explain all this to the care- 
ful reader. He may come to see if he follows the 
true course of justice, he will run against his own 
self and admit his own fate to be justice. John iii, 
19-21. This is the point at which he who ever consid- 
ered the question has stopped. We will fear nothing, 
however, but in healthy and natural logic search after 
justice and "love." Hence, it is the^object of this 
book to give the unprejudiced and thoughtful reader 
a microscopic view of his own life— his own misunder- 
stood existence. 

This work shall put clearly before him much of 
the strange or mysterious in his own life, and shall 
show unto him the why or whence came so many un- 
forseen misfortunes. It shall show unto him and 
cause him to marvel how wonderful his fate has led 
him. and that everything had to come the way it did, 
founded upon the law of justice— that there is no 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 7 

"chance," but justice pure and simple. "Mystic will 
cease and chance will become justice." 

In order, however, to understand justice in its 
fullest significance it is absolutely necessary to believe 
in an omnipotent and all-wise Being, a Being in 
whose creation I and my own mechanism are but an 
infinitessimal link, a Being- who is discoverer, builder 
and master of the same, a Being with infinite intelli- 
gence, who is able to rule unto to the most mfinitessi- 
mal of the life of each individual. 

The infinite workman has, by fitting his works to- 
gether, established the laws of cause and effect, and 
every effect is the cause of another effect and so on ad 
inrinitum, so that law follows law in every detail. The 
machinery of the Creator is the Universe, and its cog 
wheels and levers, and belts and spindles are the uni- 
versal laws. Every planetary s} 7 stem is dependent upon 
its sun and every system of suns upon the universal sys- 
tem. The laws of every planet determine the course 
of its life. All laws in their effects are the links of 
the chain of universal law, and every part is depend- 
ing upon the other. The plan, the machinery is gov- 
erned by its master. Xo more than that the machine 
can comprehend the constructor, can we, although 
intelligent, comprehend our maker. But the fact that 
we are, that we are created, a complicated, wonderful 
work, is sufficient for us to see that am infinitely wise 
and omnipotent God alone can be the originator and 
builder. Let us call this master workman, Creator, 
God or Being, it matters not — all nature, even the 
smallest blade of grass, bears witness to the fact that 
//. He, &, that It, He, is All in All. In spite of our 
self esteem, even we are not able to read the book of 
nature. By the wisdom of the same creator the 
thought of God, i. e., the idea of an infinite creative 
being has been planted in every human heart. All 
times and all races worship a highest being. To 



S FATE AND JUSTICE; OB 

deny God Is to be profane against the inner con- 
sciousness. 

2. Let us, however, leave out of consideration 
the mechanism of the body, which, indeed, in its 

smallest detail is wonderful enough, incomprehensi- 
ble indeed when we consider out of what, and how 
created for as imaginary, wise beings, and let us try 
to consider functions and attributes of the individual 
parts of our bodies. 

Who, for example, is able to explain how the eve 
can see'. What gives to that member its power of 
vision to perceive all things, both as to color and 
form? The sense of smell is no less wonderful nor 
the organ of taste in its construction. And what 
again, is it. that recalls by sense of memory, the 
pictures which the eye has seen, the aroma which 
reached the organ of smell; the taste which the tongue 
has experienced and the touch which has been felt by 
the fingers' end \ 

The materialist says that the brain thinks, and 
that every act of the nerves is carried to that organ 
by those strange channels. He would be correct, pro- 
vided he should remember or consider that however 
beautiful and <rrand the mechanism of the body might 
be. yet has the omnipotent and all-wise Creator cre- 
ated something vastly greater than that, which is the 
motor power of the same. This motor power is 

itial to give to the body its activity. It resem- 
ble- the Creator himself. It is his motor power 
which leads and guides the universe, as ours leads and 
guides our bodies. This motor power we call 
•• soul. "i— John vi, 63. 

God has endowed the soul with tools, a mechani- 
cal out tit. that it may perceive, reason and work. 
The brain is the laboratory in which everything is 
being analyzed. For the eye. the brain is the plate 
of the photographer's cauiera^'which whatever has 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 9 

been perceived, is stored away; for the ear it is the 
receiver of the telephone; for the olfactory organ the 
retainer of odor; for the tongue the retainer of taste; 
and for all organs the storehouse of touch. The 
brain, in other words, is the book of nature in which 
true to nature, the soul copies its experience, whether 
such be internal or external, experience of the inner 
man. or experience of the physical senses. 

The soul, indeed, is the only moving, feeling and 
reasoning power of the body that holds it. If it 
were not so, what would be the power to bring forth 
in memory things lost long ago? Does not the soul 
draw up the same pictures and impressions of the 
past? So then memory is a function of the soul, and 
therefore the soul is able to reason about memories 
themselves, and to form just decisions from deeds per- 
formed in a long past. The brain, then, is a book into 
which the performer, by means of his tools, i. <?., the 
nerves, the eyes, ears, the mouth, and nose, copies or 
photographs, punctually, minutely andindellibly. Out 
of that book the soul reads according to its own voli- 
tion. The soul is OURself, but not the body. The 
body is the possession of the soul, with which it can 
accomplish its ends. Without the body the soul can 
not advance upon earth. Even in our language the 
soul has its being and speaks of the members of the 
body as its mechanical parts; e.g.: My head, my 
body, etc., etc. If our body were by itself, i. e., an 
entity, it could not talk as a duality, say for example: 
/have a body, for the I and the body, under such 
conditions would be the same personality. But now 
there speaks an "/" from out the body, and when I 
say: " 1 have a body" the soul speaks of itself and 
not of the bod}'. Our own language therefore proves 
within itself the body to be a possession, i. e., a pos- 
session of the I, the soul. It is strange, indeed, that 
even our language cannot be otherwise than a wit- 



10 PATE AND JUSTICE; OK' 

oess to the truth. How many times a day does the 
soul speak out of the materialist -" I have" and t% I 
an]/' and out of the mouth of the would-be suicide 

lam sick of lifer "I am tired of this, my sick 
body; - I will pass out of this life." The strongest 
proof of our duality, the I and the being we recipe 
however, is in the face of death. The "I" has ceased 
to say "I." Every formation of the wonderful ma- 
chinery which we call body, has ceased. The eye has 
lost its lustre and the nerves their touch. The power 
has ceased which governed this wonderful piece of 
architecture, which could give an expression of anger 
to the eye or show itself in passionate love. . That 
power has passed and left its machinery l^Tclle to 
return to the charnel house of nature. The body thus 
left has no intelligence, although we know that atone 
time it did have the same. Since that intelligence is not 
there any longer, it must have passed somewhere else, 
and rt would be unreasonable to suppose that it like- 
wise had ceased to be, since it, and not the body, con- 
stituted the real personality. Even as unreasonable it 
would be to insist that the soul had not passed, for 
the reason that we did not see it as it left the body. 
The fact that we did not see the soul does indeed not 
prove that it does not exist. Has not the Supreme 
Intelligence created so many things which do not man- 
ifest themselves to our physical senses? Still they 
are. Do we see the great powers of nature, attrac- 
tion and gravitation, electricity, magnetism, heat, air, 
or other gases? Can we deny their being although 
these may not be seen in operation in any particuiTir 
thing? The most obstinate and stubborn can dtmy 
himself. If it were possible that the soul could be 
annihilated, creation would have one great error. It 
would be without an object. 

•I. The Soul, incarnate, is but at school. By 
means of its manifold experiences, joys and sorrows, 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 11 

it climbs on the scale of being. Why should it carry 
a body for three score years and ten, amidst labor and 
sorrow, pain and despair, sufferings, danger and ex- 
posure merely to be cut off at the end ? Why should 
the soul use its intelligence, from its very childhood, 
through the various ways of life, to fit the body to its 
being, to make the body subservient to its higher will, 
were it but for a little while? The battle of this 
short burdensome life would be a pitiful, unwise and 
unjust attempt in such a wonderful created harmony 
of the universe of an all-wise Master, had He not 
given the Soul the benefit of unceasing progression. 
Everyday life shows to us indeed that work is the 
stepping stone to progress, and the struggle of life is 
the road to glory and victory. Now, then, if the Soul 
does outlive the physical body as an undying entity — 
what then? 

The Soul, endowed with intelligence and with free 
volition is an image of the Creator, subject to the laws 
of progress, which latter it obtains by labor and 
strife. By means of these it makes itself Lord of 
Creation. 

As the Soul overcomes the lower steps of being, 
and breathes pure intelligence, the less is it subject to 
the lower battles of life, suffering and pain, while 
the quantity of pleasure increases with a better ap- 
preciation of the nobler sensations. Life becomes 
more and more a blessing and an adoration of the 
Omnipotent Creator. 

These pure attainments and higher steps of intel- 
ligence and mercy which have become the property of 
the Soul, are what we call Heaven. The glory of 
Heaven is adjusted to the progress of the Soul. 
Therefore, says Jesus: ;i In my father's house are 
many mansions." John xiv, 2. 

4. Heaven, indeed, can only be adjusted to the 
development of the Soul. A pupil who does not 



L2 FATE AND JUSTICE; OH 

study remains upon the lowest stages and does not ex- 
perience any joys which come as the result of accom- 
plishments. The teacher cannot let the tardy ones 
take part in the exercises of the dilligent, nor place 
the former into an advanced grade. Everything goes 
by degrees and must be accomplished by earnest ef- 
fort. In that sense there is human equality as an all- 
wise Grod has placed us here all under like conditions, 
there is no other acceptance of person with God. All 
men are the creation of God and in a truest sense his 
children. Which of all the billions of beings could 
claim a preference over any of his fellow creatures 
and say: "I come first with God. You follow after 
me." An all-wise God can onl} T be an all-just God and 
Father who must have created all with equal opportu- 
nities. Without his justice there could be no uni- 
versal harmony. Everything must be led by justice. 

"Justice must be in the Heavens and on the 
Earths." And our Father, who is likewise our teach- 
er, has put all His children under the same laws of 
eternal justice. The only upward road is by Labor 
and exertion — everyone according to his merits. 
God cannot be otherwise than absolutely just. He can- 
not have given to anyone an advantage over another. 
If there are such at the present day, they are because 
of the laws of labor and progression — the indo- 
lent cannot own the advantage of progression, as it is 
in possession of the striving and active man. 

.">. It is true indeed that in every-day life the differ- 
ence^in spiritual, moral, social and economic relations 
are very apparent, and, at first sight, one would have 
an inclination to doubt the justice of our God and 
Father. Does not the whole sensibility of man rebel 
against this inequality in the lot of life, and appeal 
to reason and natural laws. The object of this work 
therefore i< to show that God can only be just, i. £., 
absolutely just — that all human differences, inequali- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 13 

ties, sufferings and distinctions are the result of our 
own neglect. 

As God is just, and as He has placed within every 
human being the sense of right, He demands of us to 
act accordingly. The very fact that the human con- 
science, after an}^ deed of injustice, calls and troubles 
the soul, is a proof that we understand the sense of 
right as it is placed within us. 

6. Justice may be defined as "the respect for the 
right of every other human being." Justice is a 
natural law and, as feeling and conscience is placed 
into the heart of men, yet how frequently are human 
beings uujust towards one another! Passion and 
vices, however, blot out or pervert the better sense of 
right, especially with him in whom that sense is less 
active. Such a one, however, is the first to insist on 
having his rights respected. 

Why are we troubled in case of uncertainty as to 
a right course of action towards someone else? Christ 
Himself gave the key: "Whatsoever ye would that 
men should do unto you, do ye even unto them," and 
"Love thy neighbor as thyself." — Luke vi, 31. These 
words of the greatest of all spirits contain the key- 
note of Justice and Love of the centuries that are past 
and centuries yet to come. Both Justice and Love 
are laws which createjs harmony in the whole of the 
universal system. 

If God were not just toward all, without respect 
of person, then the moral and social condition would 
be worse after death than upon earth. 

7. Souls or spirits which hated and despised 
each other in earthlife or even despoiled each other, 
might meet again in the great beyond as intelligent 
beings, enemies unto death, to see each other face to 
face, and what then ? Without a doubt they do see 
each other again, and how must he feel, who has 
assassinated his neighbor to satisfy his greed or his 



14 l A IK and JUSTICE; OB 

passion, thus putting upon the family of the assas- 
sinated suffering and pain. How, in the world 
beyond, must he feel, who meets the one whom he 
assassinated, whose wife he has exposed to suffering 
and starvation, and robbed her of love and protection; 
how must he feel, as he meets the children whom he 
has robbed of a loving father, the woman whom he 
robbed of love and home? How must he feel in after 
life when he becomes conscious of the fact that he 
wasted his God-given body in idleness or in harm to 
his fellowman, much more so even as he meets his old 
associates, the ones he injured in earthlife, on that 
other shore, where they will receive him. Are not 
thousands and thousands of deeds committed each day 
which would cause men to sink crushed to the earth 
for shame could they see their victims again face to 
face \ 

As every spirit is its own intelligence, conse- 
quently its own individual, it must occupy its own 
place in space and meet its friends again as well as 
its foes. 

Love and hatred being products of the soul, are 
the mediums therefore by which friends and foes are 
found again. 

8. The world of spirits in which all hatred and 
evil finds itself again, freed from the bounds of earth, 
must be a terrible place. Pure men, absolutely 
pure, who would have no enemies to meet in the great 
beyond to embitter their existence there, must be very 
rare, and even if there are such, then these would 
have dear ones, less fortunate, whose interest or well- 
beins would be their constant care, tending to mar 
their otherwise absolute blessedness. Hence abso- 
lutely happy angel spirits would scarcely be 
found. If we consider it possible for the amount of 
crime and evil which passes out of the body with 
every individual, to meet on the other side, what an 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 15 

amount of terror it would bring about! Life on earth 
would be a thousand times more bearable than life 
after death. Xo doubt many a man, thinking about 
his future existence, is troubled. It is no wonder that 
so rnany people are in fear of d} T ing. They may have 
good cause. Not all men, however, have lived alike, 
or have stood upon the same moral stage, or moved 
on the same road. Their deeds were either better or 
worse. The righteous man has no fear of death, and 
in the world of spirits he will stand above the spheres 
of hatred and despair. 

Those lower spheres are in the truest sense "hell." 
Sufferings and heart pangs and disgrace and hatred 
and persecution are the fires and torments of hell of 
which the Bible speaks. Eternal, however, is hell 
only for him who continues to nourish within himself 
evil passions and desires. 

9. The good Father of All does not wish that 
his children, in their ignorance, should destroy each 
other or cause each other to suffer, therefore He has 
sent at times and to various people, wise and high- 
minded spirits, incarnate in human bodies, to become 
teachers and prophets of the human race, and the 
greatest of these was sent in the year one of our 
(Christian) mode of reckoning time. This high spirit, 
however, did not only step into humanity for the 
world of men alone, but more so for the world of 
spirits. He set an example to the spirits, how to 
create order and how to free themselves from the 
hatred and despair of hell. By his example he brought 
to them abolition and elevation out of the depths into 
the purer and dfviner spheres — those of peace, mutual 
love and human brotherhood. 

Christ, the highest spirit, and perhaps in the 
truest sense of the term, "a son of God," was high 
above everything characteristic to this earth — a King 
of spirits, He lowered himself to the poorest and 



PATE and ,11 8TICE; OB 

humblest of human beings, as he incarnated him- 
self in a woman to he horn as man. He took 
upon himself all labor and every burden of poor hu- 
manity. While living a pure life he preached and 
taught unto men and made them acquainted with their 
Creator, His laws and love for all, that they might be 
removed from the curse of the spirit world. 

Not in words alone did he teach, but by his own life 
illustrated how salvation could be brought about. His 
teachings of brotherhood and love, however, found 
little response with men, for the simple reason that he 
taught altruism, unselfishness, more destined appar- 
ently for the wellbeing of our neighbor than our- 
selves. It could not be otherwise, therefore, than that 
he should find enemies, mainly in the ranks of those 
in the possession of wealth, or spirits of caste, and 
these tried to take his life. Those who comprehended 
his sayings and believed his words he gathered around 
him and taught them the wisdom of his spirit, jus- 
tice and peace, human brotherhood and mutual love, 
to reward evil with good, to bless instead of to curse, 
and to substitute tolerance and union for anger and 
hatred — to do unto others as one would wish to be 
done by and even to give one's life for one's fellow 
man. 

The world of men did not understand Him well, 
much better, however, did the world of spirits which 
observed every one of His actions to their minutest 
detail. 

His death upon the cross, the high life which He 
sacrificed for others, as He knew beforehand that if 
lie should visit the earth He w r ould be killed, all this 
brought about a great revolution in the world of 
-pi r its. The spirit of Caste vanished and Pride 
3tepped at first in it^ place. Everyone felt a desire to 
imitate the King, the Son of God; to encourage mu- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 17 

tual love instead of hatred, and to assist one another 
in peaceful progression. 

When the highest of all spirits, out of His pure 
love, gives His very life for the lowest and meanest 
spirits, suffering all the miseries of earthly being, 
could any one stand out by himself and declare, "Re- 
venge is mine!"' "Hatred and Envy please me well, 
and I am more than He?'' No! With the moment of 
understanding there would come repentance, and 
then expiation begins through the scales of justice. 

The Bible tells us that during the time that the 
body of the Lord laift in the grave, the Lord himself 
(*. <>., His spirit) went into the under world and 
there to the spirits preached the Gospel-l Peter, iii, 19. 
He had shown Himself to them as highest angel, and 
likewise as suffering and martyred man on account of 
the progress which he had brought to man and the 
salvation which he had prepared for the spirits. 

The joy and praise on the part of the spirit world 
towards its Savior must have been wonderful, and 
gladly they crowned him their ruler, and Lord of fate 
on earth, until everything for which he had given his 
life had been gained and fulfilled. Therefore he says: 
" I am the way, the truth, the life, no one cometh to 
the Father but through me." John xiv, 6. 

The deed which Christ accomplished was intended 
more for the spirits than for men, and was therefore 
of vastly greater influence upon the former even than 
upon the latter. 

Every spirit could again incarnate itself , provided 
it could perceive and repent from the depth of his soul 
of all his hatred and fault, and come to the earnest 
desire to follow the example of the great Lord, to love 
his fellow men and do good to all. It could again be 
incarnated if out of free will it should desire to 
make good every evil deed ever committed, then it 
could become man again, comuience anew at the begin- 



L8 



I a l I. am> JUSTICE; OK 



ning, learn, repent, make good, improve. In other 
word- it could wash itself clean in another state of being 

and could, by good works and in time earn absolution 
from the evil committed on others. 

" Verily, hereby, I say unto thee: Excepl a man 
be horn again he cannot enter into the Kingdom of 
God." — John iii,3. Since the spirits now agreed to 
drop all hatred -to forgive one another, and to pay off 
to one another their debts (justice.) so was assured to 
them the assistance of the all-good Heavenly Father, 
the assistance of their Kino- and all His angels. Matt. 
vi. 14. They did not stand, as formerly, under the law 
alone, i. <.. they did not wait to earn their forgive- 
ness by degrees until chance, according to the law, 
would bring it about, but rather by grace, or in better 
words, through "Love." 

1 1. Love, is a destiny of fate already decided upon 
by the hand of the Lord and His ministering higher 
spirits. It is not chance, therefore, which determines 
fate, but every day it i- guided, according to pri- 
meval plans by a higher hand. Our fate and expe- 
rience being at times so wonderful and woven so mys- 
teriously, they are nevertheless guided in a wise 
course and ever for our best and progression, since it 
is not hatred, but Lore— love, pure and simple, 
which accomplishes that end. As the Lord died for His 
enemies and even prayed for them while upon the cross, 
" Father, forgive them." so duty and justice will it 
that the better spirits should guide and love its very 
enemy: yes, even to draw the enemy unto himself as 
the high Lord drawsus towards Himself: "For, (De- 
hold! I will draw all men unto me."— John, xii,32. 

L2. Since the death of the Lord the spirits are 
united in brotherhood. All act and labor for one an- 
other. A- soon as one of them has learned to perceive 
and to repent he receives the assistance of each one of 



THE KEY TO THE PKOBLEM OF BEING. 19 

them and there is nothing to mar his progress and 
spiritual development. 

The first one, who in a helpful way approaches 
him and offers him his hand and assistance is the same 
one who in earth life he has hated and whom he has in- 
jured the most. Will he refuse his hand ? Will he 
cast from himself such assistance when indeed he needs 
the help when no one else will make efforts to receive 
him I Indeed, he will not reject him, and should he 
do so, then he must be left alone, lawfully, until he 
has thought better and has come to the light; until, 
indeed, he is overcome by repentance, the despair of 
his condition and his crime, and falling upon his face 
prays for help— prays to be forgiven. Is he in 
earnest, out of the depth of his soul, to give the hand 
of brotherhood to his enemy, and does he promise, 
with hoi}' oath, to repay in good all evil committed 
upon his victim, then help is again near to him on the 
part of all those who were his victims. They all for- 
give him because he will restore all — heal all, through 
expiation. In the same way those who are his debtors. 
Mark, xi,26; Luke, xviii, 7, "But if ye do not forgive, 
neither will your Father, w T hich is heaven, forgive 
your trespasses." 

Xot the priest has a right to forgive sins (debts), 
but the creditor — the one upon whom sin has been 
committed. If I insult my friend or neighbor, then 
he, and he alone, has a right to forgive me, and he 
will do so, if I ask and promise to make good my 
error and to brin^ everything in order according to 
justice. It is of little good to my injured neighbor 
if the priest forgives 1113' sins and I do not restore to 
him the stolen or borrowed goods. Under 

the consideration, therefore, that he promises, as has 
been said above, to deal out justice towards his vic- 
tims and to improve his errors to the best of his in- 



80 



FATE AND JU8TICB; OB 



tention, he receives the permit to return to earth and 
to be re-incarnated. 

13. He, i. '., the spirit, after careful test and 
consideration, selects the kind of its new existence, 
in order to be enabled to come up to all its duties and 
to mete out justice. His former victims will take 
care that everything shall be expiated according to 
the principles of justice, and that his errors shall be 
compensated, in so far as they can assist him under 
their condition. If this is impossible to one or an- 
other, on account of his intelligence or his condition, 
then higher or more talented spirits will take his 
place. 

Perhaps his greatest enemy or even his greatest 
victim of former days may have re-incarnated, them- 
selves before him and be living as girl or woman upon 
earth. There the spirit will seek and will become 
child unto them. 

The Christian law is Love, and enemies learn now 
to love one another as mother and child. Therefore, 
the mother, who covers her child with embraces and 
caresses, for whom she would give her very life, she 
has made her enemy her own in her child. When, in 
later life, they meet again as spirits, then it is no 
longer hatred that separates, but love -which binds 
them together. 

Which is more in harmony with the wisdom and 
mercy of an all good God: Eternal hatred and so- 
called eternal damnation with a hell burning with ma- 
terial fire, or eternal union and love, a union and 
brotherhood of all? It must be understood, that 
according as the obligations are of one to another, so 
the conditions must organize themselves relatively. 
Always, and in every case, however, only in the full- 
est sense of justice. Justice alone is ruling law. The 
love of the spirits presupposes justice and makes it 
law. 



. THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 21 

14. A second incarnation therefore is not, as 
man}' suppose, a piling up of sins, but progress in so 
far as the deeds of a previous existence must be 
reconciled in the new. If there were an up-piling of 
debts, then that would be a transgression of the law 
of progress; it would be against the purpose of de- 
livery from hatred and disgrace, against the law of 
the promised brotherhood and union, and, in fact, 
opposed to the infinite love of our heaventy father. 
Because he does love us and wishes to see ail his chil- 
dren happy. He leaves this way open to us to be- 
come pure and gain the resemblance to Him. Says 
even Christ: "I draw all men unto me," and how 
would that be possible without this great work, which 
he has done for all of us, and even sacrificed his life 
for the same. It would have, been impossible. The 
spirits would even to-day still live in the bondage of 
servitude, of hatred, of revenge and selfishness. His 
high example brought to us bright sunlight, as we 
came to perceive that the way of perfection and 
eternal joy would be to return from evil, a repenting 
and reconciliation and a restoration. Out of night 
must come light — from hatred, love; from barbarism 
brotherhood. Indeed, we are not yet advanced to that 
height upon earth, but in the world of spirits there is 
such union, as there they all know that they are 
brother and sister, father and mother, lover and 
beloved. They all, we all, are mixed up in all pos- 
sible relationships -one flock, one brotherhood. Love 
and hatred bind humanity and make it justice, that 
they are connected in the name of justice by various 
incarnations and several existences. 

15. If humanity ever comes to see how closely 
we are all related then the paradise lost will have been 
found again. Brotherhood, justice and righteousness 
and respect will rise and rule before one another. 
Envy, egotism, fraud, ill advantage, adultery, murder 



l a 1 1: and JUSTICE; OR 

and suicide, which in our nineteenth century are of 
daily occurrence will cease and must cease. With the 
understanding of re-incarnation and the brotherhood 
connected therewith, there will also conic an under- 
standing of the justice of our fate. Then we will come 
to understand that the smallest injustice committed 
upon human beings, and upon animals as well, must 
be reconciled. Men will understand that whatever 
injury they intentionally inflict upon others, they do 
it unto themselves. If it is not possible to atone to- 
day, then the future existence must become responsi- 
ble therefor. 

Justice must rule. All demand it, and without 
justice 1 there would be no progression. 

16. It matters not, though a wrong or a crime 
have been committed in the dark, the smallest as well 
as the most secret deed will come to light before God 
and the whole spirit world. As soon as the spirit of 
the transgressor leaves the body and steps over into 
the other world, then the book of nature will open it- 
self before him in all colors and shades of his spent 
life. His deeds which have been recorded and photo- 
graphed by his brain stand living and real before him 
and there it is where the words of the Lord find a 
lit application: "There will be weeping and gnashing 
of teeth." The evildoer stands abashed, crushed — a 
blur of impure deeds before his Creator, God, and be- 
fore all pure spirits. He will be an outcast, and lost, un- 
til, crushed by repentance, he will ask forgiveness of 
his victims and cry for help. If he is in earnest with 
holy oath out of the depths of his soul to feel repent- 
ance for his past life and to do the first steps towards 
improvement— like the prodigal son — then he will be 
helped and accepted. He is sent back to earth to 
commence again, a child, a new life, at the beginning. 
In this new existence he must now repay all those 
evil deeds for which, as spirit, he repented, and he is 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 23 

willing, as he has promised it to God and his victims 
with a holy oath. 

Xow the reader will say: How can he do that 
since he does not remember this either as child or a 
grown man \ 

17. I have intimated before that to the child 
there is given an attendant, intelligent and just spirit, 
or one of his former victims, which so guide his life 
thaT\Tm the new existence he expiates unconsciously 
for all his former deeds. Such a guide has no easy 
work since he must always be with him, at every 
second of his waking, be it in joy or glory or in prison 
and upon the scaffold. In most cases these spirit 
guides are his former greatest victims and it must, in 
my opinion at least, be love that could persuade any 
one to become the loving guide of his enemy. This 
is a different illustration than the one to walk in the 
footprints of the Saviour, to resemble him and to die 
for one's enemies. These spirit guides prove their 
strength. 

The office of such a guide is not merely to see to 
it that his charge is receiving justice, but he must 
also strive to lead him into the right way of experi- 
ence, progress and action, and this so as not to inter- 
fere with his individual freewill. To learn something 
new is generally hard and connected with many errors, 
yet are the errors also the teachers, and without errors 
there would be no positive knowledge or understand- 
ing of the things learned. It is wrong to suppose 
that all errors committed are sin. Errors are prone 
to be made out of ignorance of the work that lies be- 
fore, and therefore does the learner, by error, gain 
certainty of the right. As every beginner makes 
some mistakes, these cannot be sin. Waste and idle- 
ness, however, lack of progression and disregard of 
the time granted, these are willful, knowing actions. 
They are sins and are punishable according to their 



-I PATE AND JUSTICE; OR 

kind. Justice punishes only according to crime, so 
she rewards according to goodness. 

Although our fate lies in the hands of our guide, 
our free will is therefore not limited, i. e., to tne ex- 
tent that our five will is in a certain relation to our 
pleasure. All new experiences and new lessons of life 
are dependent upon the free will. With brutish hand 
the guide can bedriveri off again and hischarge will then 
he sacrificed to the law and die. Woe unto that spirit 
as it reaches the spirit world again. The next repent- 
ance may become a still longer and more weary one. 

18. The Creator at the beginning has given free 
will to every creature. If it were not so, we could 
not be made responsible for our actions. Our suffer- 
ings and pain during our existence would be injustice. 
Instead of an all-good and all-wise Father we would 
have an arbitrary and barbaric God. There would be 
truly respect of person with Him. He would have 
shown partiality towards one or another in the distri- 
bution of worldly possessions while others he had 
made cripples or made to bear the burdens of the 
world, so that they would go out empty, hungry chil- 
dren. 

If free will had not been given to us, to what then 
religion, worship?— why then should men trouble 
themselves at all? We would be and always remain 
unknowing machines which can exist and labor only 
so long a- they are in good repair. 

If we are but machines without will, then we 
may as well "eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." 
If we give this idea a little consideration, we shall hud 
that this sentence itself expresses will: i. e., "Let us," 
or. "I will" eat and drink, etc. Are not all our own 
acts necessitated by our individual will? Does not 
the infant it-elf "will" when it. instead of using 
word-, tranip- with its little foot upon the floor, or 
cries for the purpose of gaining something. Are not 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 25 

most of its actions, its progressive steps, its learning 
to walk, speak, its obeyance or disobeyance, the result 
of its own will? What pupil learns more, he with a 
will or he without? He who utilizes his own will 
can not fail to come out ahead over him who has no 
definite and determined will of his own. He will do 
"something great" and gain it By his ivill. It is his 
own success, that he has become to be an important 
man. that he has become rich, happy and famous. 

Xo one who gives the matter any consideration 
will deny the free will of the individual, and only 
through the free will can we understand the just 
order of the world. God is absolutely just. In his 
justice he could not give to some of his children more 
and to others less, make one happy and another un- 
happy. More or less happiness or misfortune can 
therefore be the result of the one free will alone. 

19. God, in his justice must have endowed all 
men alike, or he could not be just, and yet to all 
appearance do we find no equality an} T where, neither 
equality of the body, of the spirit, the intelligence, 
the talents, nor of conditions at birth, etc. 

Equality nowhere. Humanity has none to show. 
Should it not exist? Should God still of His own 
free will give to each what he does not deserve? No, 
no; and a thousand times no! God is absolutely just. 
His creation, however, is so great and incomprehen- 
sible for finite man that we can understand but few 
things. If it is the destiny of the soul, however, to 
become perfect, then it is certain, that in time we 
must learn all andknow all, and the conditions would 
be that the soul would pass through all the various 
stages of being, the lowest under us as well as the 
highest above us. 

Should it be possible for us to overleap the com- 
prehension of the lowest spheres, how then could we 
understand the higher? Should it not be our work 



,Jt 1 ati: and JUSTICE; OR 

to attend the smallesl things and to understand them, 
how would that be possible without learning it? Is 
perfection conceivable without understanding^? 
Can a man becomea professor without having begun 

at the alphabet and learned at first his A BC? "As 
an absolute just God, in whom no one doubts. He 
must have created all alike, i. e., he has in the begin- 
ning given the spirit of life to every germ of the 
material world. 

There could have been no intelligence in the be- 
ginning, not until experience in the 'course of time 
congregated about the soul germ, and so intelligence 
became a property of the living being. Even an 
oyster and other low mollusks have their instinct so 
that they close or retract at the approach of an enemy. 
We do not know of a beginning, yet for all we know 
of senses we commence at the shells of the sea and 
then follow in gradations through 

20. darwin's theories of evolution, 

which in very deed containX great truths, and vet has 

that theory the one error, that it holds matter to be 
self-creating, while in truth it can be the soul only 
which determines the progress of matter. The law 
of progress is to climb step by step as the result of 
experience. The physical bodies of living beings are 
conditioned by the particular natures and' progress of 
the souls which dwell therein. Every existence of a 
- () 'il in :i material body has to show a particular 
progress through experience and practice. After 
death of the body the soul re-incarnates itself into a 
body of advanced degree and adjusts and works 
according to the new and advanced conditions. 

Through thousands of years the soul has to 
struggle over all the steps and phases of life under 
the direction of the divine and universal law in the 
harmonious order of things. Through the upward 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 27 

struggle the time roust come when the soul has gath- 
ered sufficient experience that it can have an inde- 
pendent will, as we can see every day even in the 
tinny tribe. 

The fish swims wherever he pleases. He sees his 
enemy and escapes. He espies his victim and watches 
it. hunts it and kills it. Likewise does the fish bite 
freely at a worm on a hook: has he had some expe- 
rience, however, then he will look at the bait and 
swim past without touching it. We call this com- 
monly "Instinct." while in fact it is the result of col- 
lected experience. In the higher animals we find not 
instincts merely, but intelligence. As soon as intelli- 
gence has begun with a free will, then it grows with 
every new step and new form of being. It is, how- 
ever, not said that our little earth contains all these 
successive steps. Darwin himself never round the 
missing link between ape and man, and there may be 
thousands necessary to fill out the space between ape 
and man. which in order to progress would live upon 
quite a different planet, and perhaps a planet some 
degrees below our earth. The most advanced beings 
of such a planet would become re-incarnated upon 
our earth into the lowest classes of men. Thus 
finally through struggles, extending over thousands 
of years, they would progress into the noblest classes 
of our race. 

It is absolutely necessary for the soul to pass 
through all the various stages, phases, spheres and 
categories in order to reach perfection, and God has 
made us in his image, to reach a resemblance to him, 
which is proven by the very law of eternal progres- 
sion and by the steady growth of our intelligence. 
Perfection must be the end of our destiny and how 
could we gain perfection without having learned all. 

That, or when we shall gain perfection, who 
would baffle his head about it. Upon this earth we 



PATE and JUSTICE; OR 

are not able even to make a blade of grass, not to say 

a world. And yet there must be beings who possess 
a great deal more intelligence, as they have millions 
of years m advance of us and therefore are that much 
higher in the scale. To us, those spirits, although 
they are our brothers, and sons of the same Heavenly 
lather, they are high and holy spirits. Christ, who 
brought to us the mission of a common brotherhood, 
was one of those spirits. He was, in a true sense, a 
son of God, a holy, complete spirit, incarnated in hu- 
man flesh as man, in which he, subject to carnate laws, 
standing upon our level, overcame the same. 

^ He remained pure as man, and hence elevated and 
holy over all men, our King in that light likewise. 

CAUSE OF PHRENOLOGIC SIGNS AND PHYSIOGNOMY. 

21. According as the soul develops through expe- 
rience, so the new forming bodv will be fitted .unto the 
soul. Every branch in which the soul developed, will 
show itself more complete, and as the brain is the lab- 
oratory of that which has been experienced, learned 
or attained, as we have said before, so the different 
portions of that organ take on dimensions according 
to the special attainments of the soul. 

According to attainment or habit, the spirit of an 
individual adjusts the body at the re-incarnation to it- 
self, therefore the great difference in the form of the 
head, face and body. The experiences or tendencies of 
t he spirit express themselves more freely and prominent- 
ly m the new body, as more developed or higher parts, 
and this is expecially noticeable in the face, in giving 
expressions of the indwelling spirit. If ever the time 
arrives m which phrenology and physiognomy be- 
come the common study, then we shall no longer de- 
ceive ourself in other.-, but we will be read one^before 
the other, like an open book. The character and the 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 29 

talent or knowledge of the spirit alone can be the 
cause of the great variation in facial expressions. 

Every attribute within us or about us — beauty, 
ugliness, form, virtue, intelligence, etc., must be the 
result of our own labor and attainments. 

If there were individuals among us, who, without 
their effort had special advantages, then the rest 
would be discontented on account of the unjust par- 
tiality shown towards the one and the consequent dis- 
regard of the other. Each one would claim the right 
of the other and exclaim: "Why; why has this one 
more right than myself? Why is he prepared?" 

Yes. we would go further in our questions and 
say: " Why is he better than we, than I? I suffer 
and he is happy. Has he deserved anything better 
than I, and why? And yet in this very exclamation, 
'to be better,' etc., is a declaration that 'personal 
effort ' must be the necessary cause of such apparent 
advantages. Every thoughtful reader can put him- 
self in that case and will feel and exclaim with us: 
* Justice, and justice only can be the cause of such 
apparent preference, for God must be absolutely just.' 
This is the logical conclusion, that: only as the result 
of our own effort is our individual condition, being 
as it is. " 

HEREDITY. 

22. It seems as though I heard our readers say: 
"All those various characteristics and conditions are 
but the result of inheritance from our parents, grand- 
parents, etc. It is well worth our while to notice in 
children the great resemblance to one another, and 
towards their progenitors, but just as true it is that 
for example, John resembles both his father, grand- 
father, aud the whole line of ancestors; while in 
James, his brother, there is hardly a trace of resem- 
blance toward any of the family. 



:;o 



I A II. AND ,11 stick; OR 



If our characteristics and forms are inherited in 
a family, why are there, in one and the same family 
suchgreat differences, not only in physical appearance 
but also m the talents of the children? Does it not 
happen that in the same family there is being born a 
great genius and a great idiot J Doea it not happen 
that brunette parents give birth to blonde or auburn 
children, and vice versa? However much children 
resemble their parents this does not prove that they 
have inherited their moral qualities. Does the reader 
know whence they came — { ("but thou canst not 
tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth."— John 
m, 8,) and who these children are? For all he knows' 
John may be the spirit of the grand-father, and 
James, the one of a former enemy or friend, whom jus- 
tice ordained to offer tribute and reconciliation here in 
the same family. 

Is it not natural that the spirit which had not 
made equal progress in all faculties during its former 
existence, should retain many a resemblance from 
that state, so that in many respects the present John 
resembles the grand-father to a hair, and that even 
the characteristics of the grand-father became those of 
John,— but these change to some extent the form of 
the head, and therefore the form of the face^ so that 
John does not carry an exact head of the grand-father, 
and yet a great resemblance. 

The changes which the spirit underwent through 
experience from one existence to another become the 
characteristics of the new body already in the mothers 
womb. If that was not the case there would be no 
alteration. Once created we would remain in form 
what we were before animal or man. There would 
be no evolution, no progress. It would all remain 
the Bame. If "change,'* as evolution, did not take 
place, no creature, no being, could live further, and 
the world would to-dav cease to be. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 31 

Resemblances between children and parents are 
likewise to be found in the relationship of the spirits. 
Like-minded spirits or such standing upon the same 
stage of developments would have resemblances and 
would become incarnated with one another and thus 
form a type. We see that in e very-day life, where 
people of the same mind gather together to form 
clubs, societies, etc. How much more would not that 
take place in the spirit world, especially where there 
is a common tie of justice binding them together? 

To the student there are so many differences, dif- 
ficulties and inexplainable facts in the families, the 
fates of men, the social conditions, etc., that it is 
impossible for him out of all the present theories to 
find a proper solution, and he must exclaim, "It is all 
theory, mere theory! It cannot be so, or so, for God 
must be just! This world-order has a different founda- 
tion. Wherever laws rule they must govern by vir- 
tue of justice. 



p^.a.rt ii. 

ARE OUR FATES JUSTICE? 

23. Xow, then, dear reader, we will leave all 
theories aside, and draw our conclusions from every- 
day facts, in so much so that we base all appearances 
of life upon the absolute justice of God. Taking this 
as the foundation upon which to build, we must arrive 
at the truth and bring light, more light, into that 
labyrinth, so little understood — the cause of our fate 
and being. 

24. As we believe in an intelligent human soul — 
which we cannot and will not deny — as we understand 
it to be the moving power of matter, which has . lived 
and must continue to live, no matter in what form — 
a> we do know that the soul, in this bodily condition, 



82 FATE and JUSTICE; OH 

progresses and evolves, both intellectually and moral- 
ly, according to law, getting more and more perfect 
in the resemblance to its Creator, we must draw the 
logical conclusion that the soul must, sometime, reach 
perfection itself. As every experience enriches the 
soul, and to live without experience would seem an 
impossibility, the soul could possibly not gain perfec- 
tion in a common life time, which may at best be 
eighty or an hundred years. It would of necessity 
take several life-times, and the way toward perfection 
had been found in the great example of Christ. Then 
let us search further upon that path and try to prove 
that re-incarnation is a truth, a wonderful and neces- 
sary truth, and in fact the only way to gain perfection. 
Furthermore, all this is possible only by way of ahso- 
lute just /<■>-. 

•J."). If justice, or better, absolute justice, gov- 
erns the laws of the world, if it governs the fate of 
nations as the fate of the individual, and thus, accord- 
ing to lav/ orders progression, why and whence then 
all those terrible catastrophj&s the earth over? Why 
the ruin of nations? Why pestilence, disease, 
famines and starvation, the sinking, flooding and 
drowning of entire cities and villages, railroad disas- 
ters, landslides, explosions, destruction both by fire 
and by frost, etc. ? Just look at the various fates of an 
individual and it is marvellous what all may and does 
often happen to one man. 

26. With peaceful and happy smiles upon his 
face he leaves his loved ones in the morning, and per- 
haps within an hour his body has been torn to pieces 
by a boiler explosion and is thus presented to his 
home. Chance would have it that he should pass the 
place the instant that the boiler exploded. Chance! 
we say. A misfortune — chance! But who is to blame 
fortius chance? Was it no chance that he should 
happen to pass that place at a present moment? His 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 33 

own, iu their despair, exclaimed: "Why (!) should (?) 
it happen just to him. our loving- father?'' "The 
neighbor tells us that the person killed leaves a fam- 
ily of six little children, etc." 

'27. Such a case is as sad as it is common. Yet 
the world asks no further questions and seems to have 
but little sympathy for the orphans. But a sympa- 
thetic feeling man will ask: If there is an all-good 
and omnipotent God, why does He permit such terri- 
ble suffering to happen ? If He has made the world 
unto the smallest detail, why is He powerless to pre- 
vent such "chance?" or should He be so unjust and 
take pleasure in our pain? 

28. A young man of my acquaintance, R. H., 
in C, while sitting in a chair, fell, face downward, 
into the hot ashes of the fireplace and so terribly 
burned his head and face that the flesh hung down in 
strips. A part of the nose only, one eye, half of 
the upper lip and one ear were uninjured. While he 
fell into the fire he could not liberate himself, 
although he was nineteen years old. His sister, who. 
during that time had entered the room, lifted him 
upon his bed. It is terrible when I think of it. I 
heard his sister say: "That such a good boy must 
suffer so terribly. O, my dear Bob, why must you 
suffer such terrible agony? Why should that happen 
to your* He seemed to hear his sister's pitying- 
words and with his one eye he looked up to her, and 
from the expression in his face I felt that he knew 
"Why?" 

She looked up to me and I told her: "God is 
always just. He can do nothing wrong." In a 
strange way. as though she did not understand, she 
turned to her brother and repeated what I had said. 
He >eemed to agree with it. 

It may be hard to understand by the small human 
spirit, that a loving father of all should by such ter- 



:'.) i a 1 1 am> JUSTICE; OB 

rible method* destroy His own children— that He 
should have permitted such chances. Jt would appear 
to me that either creation was wanting something 

there, or if God had created such chances, then He 
should be a willful being without feeling and without 
sympathy. But it is more likely that what we term 
chance is the result of the same wisdom which is 
manifested everywhere else. 

Although we do not understand our own selves, 
and that -jmr the all-wise Father leads His creatures 
through the harmony of the worldLvJit is not proven 
that we understand his ways nor can we prove that 
chance is outside of the dominion of God. 

:_".». To the limited human understanding there 
is at best so much dark and incomprehensible in the 
wisdom of God which can only be cleared by the 
future. 

••The uighl must disappear and shine forth like the day. 
Like clouds Of fogs that unite and purify and rise, so the 
niiiht becomes the pure light of the soul" — 

If it had pleased Supreme Wisdom to create wis- 
dom out of what we term ignorance or chance, what 
then? 

Would our innermost being not be more satisfied 
if we knew and understood that all our sufferings and 
our woe- are but justice? Indeed it would! But 
because it does not suit the limited human under- 
standing, therefore he will not let it pass nor admit 
it. and rather accuse God of imperfection, grumble 
at His injustice, and place His wisdom upon his own 
human stage rather than to rise himself to justice 
and truth. Although he sees it within himself and 
outside of himself, yet he will not believe nor admit 
thai those incomprehensible things are of the highest 
wisdom. 

30. Would a wise and good teacher keep up the 
discipline of his school by taking the part of one 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 35 

pupil against another? Would not bis pupil notice 
that at once and rise against it or murmur i If one 
of them should injure another, would not the teacher 
try. with all his power of wisdom, to judge justly 
and to punish the guilt}^? Would a loving father 
punish or even injure his child without just cause? 
Why is a desire for justice a characteristic of the 
human spirit I and this being the case should the 
all- wise and all-good God not be in possession of the 
same attribute? Why should He have planted such 
an idea of right in the human heart and he devoid of 
it himself f To suppose omnipotence to be unjust 
is against all reason and feeling. Not God alone, 
nor mef^His creatures, too, demand and practice 
justice. 

31. How could our social laws be such if they 
were not based upon the idea of justice. I do not 
mean to intimate that they are just. They are never- 
theless an attempt of justice and based upon it. The 
laws were made according to the ideas of justice on 
the part of law-makers. As the law-givers them- 
selves are more or less unjust, their laws cannot be 
exemplars of absolute justice? We are under the 
necessity, therefore, from year to year to alter our 
laws and to improve them; we improve them because 
we see that they were not just i. e., according to the 
growth and development of our sense of justice. 

32. If ever justice in the high sense in which 
Christ taught it. is understood by the race, then capi- 
tal punishment through human judgment will cease? 
And along with this a great many other wrongs. We 
will all be brothers, fathers, mothers. To kill a 
fellow being out of hatred, or because he is not as 
perfect as we, not "as well progressed in the scale of 
being, or in a fashion, " to send him to hell" with a 
feeling in our heart that u He is not good enough for 
this earth or for us," "We cannot use you here," 



36 i aii: and JUSTICE; OR 

"We all doubt it, whether the executed murderer 
will get into heaven." All this is not for limited man 
to do or say. Since it cannot he supposed that a man 

who was not good enough and casts out of this, our 
earth, should he good enough for heaven, an execu- 
tion is equal to sending a man to hell. Everyone 
understands our old ideas regarding hell, fire and 
brimstone where there is to he weeping and gnashing 
of teeth. Yet by execution we cast the criminal, our 
brother, into it, indifferent to the fact whether he 
will cook or roast, for eternal time. What a barbar- 
ism on the part of civilized men! So it is— yet to 
think so far is too terrible for all of us. With eyes 
shut and head bent we press the trigger, mav there 
come what will, and we send our misguided brother 
into the great beyond, indifferent as to what will 
happen to him, even though endless pain should he 
his destiny. Notwithstanding our teacher says: 
"Love your enemies!" "And whatever ye would 
that men should do to you, do ye also unto them." 
— Luke vi. 27. 

"Indeed such transgressions of justice are retalli- 
ated upon the guilty nations. 'With what measure 
ye mete it shall be measured to you again.' — Matt., 
vii: 1-2. Because we do not want to help along the 
4ke young and unemployed pupil whom God has sent 
upon earth, we kill him and send him (for all we be- 
lieve) to hell. We would kill his soul as well as his 
body if we only could. We have set our minds 
upon it that he must get out of the way. 'He is a 
murderer." we say 'he must he killed likewise,' for 
whoever sheds human blood, his blood shall likewise 

-lied,' etc., although the Lord himself answers, 
Vengeance is mine. 5 Who told us to kill? 'Judge 
not that ye may not he judged,' and all blood 'shall be 
required of this generation.'" — Luke xi, 5. 

The murderer has killed— hut why? Have we, 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 37 

besides the guilt of bis deed, also studied his charac- 
ter and his moral standard, L e. the stage of moral de- 
velopment upon which he stands? Indeed not! 'Be- 
sides the guilt of his deed we have proven nothing, 
and upon that alone we have put him out of the world. 
Have we proven what we could have made of him if 
we had raised and educated him instead? 

Perhaps he was a good man otherwise with the 
one exception that he had not yet given up that great 
weakness of a high temper, and in such a moment he 
had killed his neighbor. For this one act of an other- 
wise perhaps good man we give to him death upon 
the gallows, and that after the investigation and judg- 
ment of "wise** and ; 'civilized*' men. Say that the 
murderer was a robber and had killed, out of bar- 
barity and selfishness, then barbarit}' and selfishness 
were his faults. Perhaps he did not understand any- 
thing about the love of God nor the love of neighbor, 
nor did he believe in the justice of God or the eternal 
life. He was a still unexperienced spirit, standing be- 
low us and approaching the animal spirit, perhaps an 
arrival from a smaller or lower planet and incarnated 
upon our earth the first time. It was his destiny to 
be assisted along the higher lines b}^ us better creat- 
ures on earth. Or it is possible that he was the spirit 
of an Indian, incarnated in the lowest stage of the 
white man. 

Do v:e knoiv that it is not so? 

It is no matter. He was here as a pupil of the 
lower class and it was the duty of the more advanced 
to teach him better, to overcome his error and to lead 
him into a higher sphere of life — to awaken within 
him a desire for the good and true — for beauty, right 
and justice — for love towards an enemy as well as 
towards a neighbor. In other words: It is the duty 
of man upon the higher sphere to draw the brother 
from the lower sphere up to him as Christ draws 



Bo PATE AM) JUSTICE; OB 

us unto himself. "Behold I draw all men unto me." 
John xii, 32. 

•33. We cut off from the evil doer all the 
branches of learning, cut him off, in a barbaric way, 
from every development. ;is though he were not wor- 
thy to become better. Why do we not have schools 
of development (reformatories) for such lower spirits, 
instead of penitentiaries, in which progression is 
taught and brought about? Why don't we hunt up 
all low characters and put them under the care of 
good men — soul teachers. 

If we had such reformatories in the different parts 
of our country, where the lower spirits would be 
taught the ideas of true brotherly love as well as other 
branches of knowledge, we should soon have good 
parents who would be able to train their children in a 
resemblance to them. Our present mode of raising 
children, by foolish and immoral parents, is one of 
our greatest evils and one of the causes of our well 
stocked penitentiaries. It is not likely that good 
children spring from bad parents, and the fruits of 
the evil parent growj^ forth in the third and fourth 
generations, as it is also written: "I will visit the 
sins of the parents unto the third and fourth genera- 
tions.*' We can call this ;4 the training 6n the part of 
the parents," or " the inheritance of the children from 
the parents;" it is about the same thing. That is evi- 
dently the sense in which the scripture passage is in- 
tended. If therefore we train our children through 
the proper schools, then, in course of time we get good 
parents. Then, inheritance of evil tendencies into the 
third and fourth generations will cease. 

54. Now, the reader will ask: "Will you exempt 
the criminal from all just punishment ? Indeed, not! 
That would not be justice. But the just punishment 
he shall not receive until he has come to understand 
the folly of his ways, when, besides thai he has im- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 39 

proved many of his errors in the course of this earth 
existence. In fact when he has become a more ad- 
vanced man has he become a more perfect man? 
then his inner feeling will assist him as again he thinks 
back over his evil ways. Whenever his deeds haunt 
his soul, he will come to the determination: Xever — 
never again, to injure his fellow man. 

After having become a more humane member of 
civilized society, he will, of himself, repent and atone 
for his crimes. 

"Vengeance is mine," says the Lord — and ere 
we are aware there happens to the repenting mur- 
derer a just chance which causes him to suffer as once 
he caused his victim to suffer. Thus he atones by the 
will of a just God. Instead of being burdened with 
faults, crimes and charges, and sent into hell, his 
spirit steps over — better and pure. 

Thus should we act towards the weak and the 
erring — lift them up instead of cutting them off by an 
unjust death from eveiy chance to become better, then 
we would receive reward therefrom — just reward, in- 
stead of punishment. 

Let us search into the history of a people, of a 
community, a state, a nation — and it will be clear to 
us. why villages, communities, cities and countries are 
visited by great natural calamities. The great Father 
will not destroy hundreds and thousands of men. un- 
less justice demanded it. The laws of nature and the 
natural forces are in His hands, and He can guide them 
as justice demands it. We must not forget that God 
can be only just — absolutely just, and consequently 
His works and His whole order of the world must 
be just. 

Let us follow a punished criminal — how he will 
fare after his entrance into the great world of spirits, 
then we must feel with him that his transition must he 
comparatively easier than though he had been trans- 



i I ia n: and JUSTICE; OH 

ported " by chance " through the hand of God. En- 
stead of expecting k< weeping and gnashing of teeth," 
he will enter the greal beyond with a smile upon his 
lip> as he knows that he has become better and purer 
in atoning for his crime. 

lie will rise higher in the order of spirits. He 
will now. as spirit, remember everything plainly that 
he had done while in earth life, as the Hook of Nature 
lie- now wide open before him, showing him all his 
deeds. His only end and aim is now to bring every- 
thing into order. He discovers that there is still a 
great deal more to expiate and that he must con- 
quer many other faults if he intends to climb up 
higher. He can as spirit atone for many things, and 
yet. for his progress he needs more experience — as 
man upon earth. 

We will recall a few more errors which, as black 
spots, seem to adhere to and, as evil nature, deform 
him. In his former existence upon earth he was 
quick tempered, quarrelsome, and during one of those 
attacks had .smashed his neighbor's head with a club, 
but fortunately for him his neighbor escaped with his 
life: he has broken the arm of another, and to a third 
one he had put a knife blade into the right breast, yet 
in the crowd and the darkness of the night he made 
good his escape. Not a few had he insulted by a slap 
in the face, for he was strong and feared no one. We 
need not speak of his profanity nor his insults, for 
these were of every-day occurrence. Towards his 
wife he was coarse and tyrannical. He could not en- 
dure red haired people, and cursing and insulting 
them, he put every possible difficulty in their way. 

We see then, that, although he has come to see 
tin- error of his ways, and repents, there is still a 
heavy burden for which to atone — many un atoned 
error>. which wait for him. and I say: Are there not 
many, very many, even to-day, who are heavier bur- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 41 

dened than this example? Yes, yes, the answer comes 
back to me, there are scores of criminals, who pre- 
meditatingly destroyed whole families and — went out 
empty! Empty? Should not he, after having atoned 
for murder, be still a debtor to the one whose head he 
smashed: to those whom he gave a box upon the ear; 
to him whom he sent a ball through his thigh, he a 
debtor to his wife for the tyranny and injury and to 
the red-haired one for the curses and insults? 

•' Verily, I sa} T unto thee, Thou shalt by no means 
come out thence, till thou hath paid the uttermost 
farthing." — Matt. . v, 26. "An eye for an eye and 
a tooth for a tooth."— Matt., v, 38; and "With 
what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you 
again. — Matt. vii. 1-2. If he had an enemy, who be- 
comes under oblioation^ to him, by doing him an in- 
jury, then justice will incarnate that enemy to him 
as his child. 

35. The re-incarnated spirit — as embiyo — will 
be adjusted according to him and his moral form and 
condition, his faculties and brain power, and all this 
will show itself in the head and face. According as 
the tendency of the soul, so he will tend to form the 
physiognomy of the new body before birth. As the 
character of an acorn can bring forth no linden tree, 
bo can no ill-natured spirit bring forth an agreeable 
and inviting exterior. 

It is commonly the case that both parents and 
neigh bors rejoice at the arrival of an infant — so it 
will be with the new citizen^ of the world — for who 
can tell but he was the murderer and we his enemies. 
Now he is our child and we love him, and though he 
had ever so many deformities, and though he did not 
resemble any of the other family members, yet so 
much the greater is a mother's love. 

Could we but know whence our child has received 
its failings or deformity, although we can trace no 



49 PATE AND JUSTICE; <>K 

similar case in the family line of either the father or 
mother, yet in spite of it all the very deformity tends 
to reconcile the child — and all ill-spoken and insulting 
words which in a former state of being were com- 
mitted by him he now in justice hears, he learns to 
love. 

36. The little fellow now utows up under a 
father and a mother's love who give him a good trail- 
ing and good schooling. He becomes a good and in- 
telligent man. only he seems to have frequent misfor- 
tunes and meets with many unforseen defeats. It 
seems as though the boy is haunted by misfortune. 
It is only about a year ago that he recovered from a 
broken head, which happened through a falling brick 
and which came near costing him his life; last week a 
horse kicked him and knocked out some teeth and to- 
day he fell down stairs and broke his arm. The boy 
is unfortunate and will remain so until he has expiated 
for every cut, club, oath, insult or injury. His par- 
ents, as the whole world of his acquaintance, call that 
•"misfortune"— "unfortunately he has been born in an 
unlucky hour." or else, "mere chance," — it would ap- 
pear 'oily, at first sight, to think that the hand of fate 
had led everything as it came about, and that there- 
fore it must happen as it did. Chance, however, is 
not supposed to be folly, and to decide that he has 
been born at an unlucky hour is the conclusion drawn 
and •"chance" explained. 

After our boy had grown up and learned a trade 
he was drawn into military service and into the war. 
As journeyman he had many difficulties with his fel- 
low laborers, although he kept neutral as much as 
possible, for this time he was not as large and strong 
as his companions which wa- a case of continual worry 
to him. and on one occasion he received a knife thrust 
in the right breast which for some time confined him 
to the hospital. I- it justice that a large and brutal 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 48 

man, after having- made wrong use of his strength, 
should begin diminutively again and so be placed in 
the position of the weaker person, as he once placed 
them \ He was-w** wounded in battle by a ball pass- 
ing through his thigh, and tramped in his face under 
the feet of his comrades. While a traveling journey- 
man he learned to know a.young woman, who now be- 
came his wife. He loved her and yet he sufferred 
many unhappy moments, for he had not expected her 
to be the terror which she turned out to be. He had 
to listen to many unkind words on the part of his 
wife, so that even the evening, after the day's labor 
and worry, did not prove a rest unto him. Bravely 
he held up under his burden, and loving hi-s wife in 
spite of all, he remained true to her. At heart he 
felt peace and satisfaction that he acted like he did. 
He felt that he must suffer as his whole life seemed to 
be destined to pain. He w T as correct, he had been 
born to pain like so many, many others — and not with- 
out cause. 

His ill-tempered help-mate, in a former existence, 
was his suffering and tyranized wife, who now caused 
him to atone to his own best wdiat he had formerly 
done unto her. AVhen they met in this world of spir- 
its, he as repentant sinner knelt down before her, ask- 
ing forgiveness and promising with holy oath that he 
would love her and atone for everything. She ac- 
cepted his oath and decided again to become his wife 
to repay to him piecemeal and in the same mint as he 
had paid her, in order that he may improve. 

For this end, and in order that she may have the 
power to do it, she received a guide (protecting spirit) 
who leads her in all her actions. As re-incarnated hu- 
man being she knew no more of all that, but her in- 
ner feeling, caused by her guide, convinced her that 
she must do so and not otherwise. 

She paid back to him every indignity — every ill 



11 I A II. AM) JUSTICE; OR 

word and had action, and not until late years, when 
all had been atoned for. peace and happiness came to 
both. 

•'Thou shalt by no means come out thence till 
thou hast paid the uttermost farthing" — Matt. , v, 26. 
O, how many a couple, who supposed themselves to 
be unfortunate, when one repays the other, will part 
and seek the courts for a divorce. (), how falsely 
have you understood; how imperfectly do you stand 
your trial, which you yourself have chosen. Already 
in the world of spirits you decided that you would 
together go back to earth, to love one another, to cor- 
rect each other's failings and to atone for all ill. 

37. -Already in the world of spirits there w T as 
destined to each one his wife or her husband. Each 
one had known the other already and they were bound 
together in justice. For "Marriages are made in 
Heaven," No matter though they may be living 
thousands of miles apart, fate will bring them togeth- 
er; they may find each other in the most curious way, 
but they will come together. I smile at times 
when hearing a person say: u O, had I taken this one 
or that one, I would now be happier!" Why did you 
not do so? Why did you not take him? Why not 
this one, you foolish one, and that one you let go? 
But, as we have seen, our fate has been laid with us 
in our cradle, and our marriage has been decided upon 
in J leaven, and, indeed by ourselves, through our 
own will and justice, by which alone we can progress 
and develop. Justice is law and our fate must be 
carried out in so far as we do not cut off our life by sui- 
cide or other crime, as by that the errors of old would 
not be atoned for and justice must again seek another 
route, which may be even more difficult and demand 
more time. Woe unto those who do not pass through 
the trials which they had promised. They have lost 
another existence. The second pain at the entrance 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 45 

into the World of Spirits will be more severe than the 
first, and perhaps more lasting, drawing out. appar- 
ently, to eternity. Then the chances to bring about a 
reconcilliation and atonement may not be found with 
the same ease, and after it has been reached the pun- 
ishment will be more severe. The disturbing spirit 
must be bound stronger than before that it may become 
more difficult to break the ban. Instead, as formerly, 
with healthy limbs, he comes as a cripple upon earth, 
or in such a condition that he would be glad when 
man will recie.ve him. He must suffer all the insults 
that man can cast upon him, and may not many nor 
receive the caresses of love, although his heart may be 
yearning after the loving relations of home-life. This 
existence then would be one of greater suffering than 
the former one would have been, had he faced it 
squarely and bravely and lived it out. 

38. It must be so. dear reader, how else would 
progress be possible, and how could man become per- 
fect without an improved and purified soul? 
Through experience alone, and often through terrible 
experience, always in the way of justice, do we reach 
perfection. "Justice must govern in Heaven as on 
Earth." how else could we account for the many new- 
born cripples ( Everything is justice and the conse- 
quence of our own action. AH our accidents are 
caused by our own mistakes. God is and must be 
absolutely just! 

God, as a just and loving Father, cannot oive 
strong limbs and a healthy body, wisdom and reason, 
wealth and possession, to one and cause the other to 
be born a cripple, or perhaps by chance deform him; 
another by chance to be an idiot, and let thousands 
of otherwise good people suffer want, degradation and 
poverty, while a bad man may own millions of dollars 
and live in the abundance of the world. 

It is apparent to every one that there is a very 



Iti FATE AND JUSTICE; OB 

unequal distribution of wealth in the world. The 
wretch is Leaning himself up against his wretchedness, 
the ugly, that it has to be just him. The 
poor man is discontented because he is better and 
poorer than his wealthy neighbor wh$is as bad as he 
is rich. * • w 

He does not consider that our heavenly father can 
be only just and gives to each what he deserves. He 
does not consider that things are as they are, as the 
result of his own fault. 

39. We all understand, as far as we are able, 
that wealth has a different influence over us, accord- 
ing as we have inherited it from our parents or have 
earned it ourselves. The poor man knows that had 
he been born rich, he would not have to serve the rich 
man for his daily bread. These are facts, and it 
seems to the poor man that he is as good as the rich 
man whom he serves. His observations cause him to 
grumble, and he begins to blame his creator, that he 
is a man as well as the rich one; that there is no just 
cause why he should not be in as good circumstances, 
or live by lighter work and under less care. Why 
could not he have been born the child of the rich man. 
Why so poor as to have to earn his bread by the sweat 
of his brow? If God were a loving father, loving all 
his children with equal love, why, since I have done 
my duty, may someone else, from birth, have more 
of this earth's goods and be happier than I? If there 
is a just God, why then such great differences? 

Man puts to himself all these questions, the beg- 
gar, the poor, the cripple, the laborer, and, in fact, 
everyone who feels himself below the rest of the 
world without being able to give himself a satisfac- 
tory answer. Only the rich man never puts the ques- 
tion. Whether his wealth is a gift of God, whether 
:t is justice that he has received it, and why and for 
what purpose? Could he believe that the wealth had 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 47 

been loaned to him b} r God only for a short period, he 
would try at once to apply it in doing good. We 
must never forget that God is just in all things, and 
we shall rind a satisfactory answer to our difficulty. 

" Seek, and ye shall find." 

Do you, poor and discontented one, know what 
you were before you were borne upon earth? Do 
you know whence you came and wiry 3^0111* mother 
bore you ? Do you know, in case you lived on earth 
before, ichom you were, and whether or not the last 
time you were wealthy, very wealthy, and that your 
wealth became your moral and spiritual ruin? You 
know nothing of all that, for now you have another — 
a new body, a body whose eyes cannot see the im- 
pressions of your former bod} T , and } T our present 
brain has none of the impressions of that brain which 
you had during your former existence. 

It is the spirit which receives and adopts all expe- 
riences by means of its tools, but the new bod} r , as a 
tool, knows nothing thereof, except what itself, as 
body, does. Impressions alone, like dark or distant 
memories, will occur to the present brain innate ideas, 
comprehensions, premonitions, etc., etc. 

An old and experienced spirit will have a greater 
impression upon its body than a younger or less expe- 
rienced one, and the ability to comprehend or to per- 
ceive are therefore either more or less plain. 

From this it ma} 7 be understood that there are 
people who can see deeper into those dark causes and 
actions of this or the spirit life, which are but little or 
not at all understood by the majority of men. That, 
too, is justice, that some spirits have lived longer and 
experienced more than others. So we can explain on 
the same grounds the cause of the different characters 
of children of one and the same family. We can un- 
derstand why one child may be a high moral character, 
another a musical genius, still another a mathemati- 



18 FATE and ,n stick; OH 

cian, and a fourth one seems not endowed at all. So, 
likewise, founded upon what we were and how we 
lived in our former existence, our present condition of 
wealth or poverty may be explained. 

Not poverty only, but wealth likewise is a trial of 
life. The spirit which is permitted to incarnate itself 
selects with the help of other spirits the condition 
which it believes the most tit or desirable to its prog* 
ress and development. As he was rich the last time 
and his wealth had brought him no progress, but vice 
and weakness only, and as he fell under the test, so he 
chooses a condition under which he will be able to re- 
deem everything, thus hastening his development. 
He may have been one of those whom God had given 
wealth that he would be enabled to do good for his 
fellow beings, but who, instead, in time of the terrible 
blizzard which swept over the country, used his wealth 
in speculation in the coal trade that he might increase 
its sum on account of the common misery. Instead of 
relieving the common distress he has taken advantage 
of it, and thus, more or less, by means of his wealth 
he has become one of the causes of the starvation and 
-ami -its twin-sister — famine — which destroyed many of 
his fellow men. 

AVoe! what shall become of such a wealthy, 
heartless speculator and usurer, upon whose soul rests 
the death of many a helpless one? How can justice 
be dealt upon such a one? " A tooth for a tooth." 
Justice demands just retribution sometimes. In the 
sweat of his brow, like the others, he will have to earn 
his bread, to found his little home, and when the time 
has been fulfilled, starve or freeze to death. The con- 
ditions change from one existence to another. The ser- 
vant of to-day does not know but he may have been 
the tyrant and cruel master of his present lord, and 
must now learn how it feels to eat the bread of an- 
other in servitude. u With whatever measure ye 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 49 

mete it shall be measured to you again."— Matt. 
vii. 1-2. Justice levels all, even the smallest wrong-. 
Therefore the oppressed and the poor shall rind 
consolation in the thought, as he has chosen the con- 
ditions under which he lives, and, when he carries his 
cross patiently and contentedly his next existence 
must become a better one. '"If any man will come 
after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross 
daily and follow me." — Luke, ix, 23. 

40. How many a man, w T ho to-day holds his head 
above the world, proud of his wealth and closing his 
hand against the crying needs of humanity, when in a 
few years, in a new existence, may be seen raking in 
the ash-piles of our large cities, eking out a miserable 
living. Upon him the retribution is coming. " For 
I was hungry and ye gave me no meat. I was thirsty 
and ye gave me no drink," and I know ye not. 
Matt., xxv, 35-46 Xow, he must feel and learn — he 
must want, and in his poverty, despair. "Lazarus," 
who is now elevated, is not permitted to listen to his 
entreaties, as justice is the great go&J between them. 
It must be expiated. Luke, xvi, 26. 

The rich man now is humbled and must gather 
the crumbs which fall from the table of him whom he 
once disregarded, and from out his misery he calls 
upon heaven for help and relief. Then the answer 
comes back. We cannot help you. You lived in all 
the fullness of life and had no mercy upon poor Laz- 
arus, nor upon any of the poor who were hungry and 
asked for work or bread. Xow you must feel it until 
justice has become satisfied. The unfinished expia- 
tion is "the gear* between us. 

The illustration of the rich man and Lazarus is 
very good, except that it is not being understood in 
the sense in which Christ intended it. The common 
conception places the rich man in hell for all eternity. 
But let us put ourselves in the place of Lazarus as 



60 FATE AM> .11 STICE; OB 

down-trouaen and cast out by the man who lives in 
fullness and waste, who instead of offering us bread 

for our need or water to wash our wounds, would 
drive us from his door, who would he hut << sample of 
many of our own day, who will say: ''I cannot pay 

any attention to such people. Life is too short, etc.. 
get away from here and look out for yourself/' 
What would good men, who had gone through the ex- 
perience of life do in place of Lazarus in order to teach 
a lesson to this merciless man? Would not we let 
him feel what we felt, but if we did. we would 
not make it any worse, we would not be more 
merciless than he and extend it throughout all eter- 
nity. Do we become better or worse through the 
experiences of poverty? The poor Lazarus was 
raised into Heaven, hence he must have become better 
through his poverty and pain. We, too, become bet- 
better, for experiences are progress and progress is 
improvement for good. It stands to reason then that 
after we ourselves had gained power and honor we 
would not treat the once rich man worse than he 
treated us especially not for eternal times. 

No. no, a good man cannot will anything wrong, 
how much less can God, the father of love, of pa- 
tience, of mercy and forbearance, who takes the prod- 
igal son to his heart with all parental love? No; and 
a thousand times no! He shall receive justice only, 
and not an iota more. He shall redeem himself as 
soon as he will cry to Heaven, tilled with repentance. 
And when his time of redemption is past he will be as 
pure a child of the Father, like you and I. The debt 
which he has had to pay to you and me has made him 
wiser and better and his next existence will be that of 
a good man. 

In this new light of the re-incarnation of the 
spirit do we see the works and sayings of our Lord 
.Ion- Christ in a new and clearer light. In the light 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEIXG. 51 

of re-incarnation alone is it possible to understand the 
Bible, and especially the New Testament. God the 
Father becomes more positive in our sight and yet as 
all-wise Omnipotent Creator — hoi}', holy, holy above 
all things holy! The idea of the barbaric, terrible, 
willful god disappears to make room for a just and 
loving Father of humanity who, through his most be- 
loved child, Jesus Christ, draws all his other children 
unto himself. "No one comes to the Father but through 
me." — John xiv,6. 

How could a good father, say, as good spirit, see 
his child suffer the torments of hell without stepping 
down from his seat in heaven and come to the rescue 
of his wayward offspring. How can the spirit of the 
mother while dwelling in the heavenly spheres see her 
child thus? How can the child see the parents, the 
youth see his beloved in terrible suffering for eternal 
times, and then be happy in heaven? It is prepos- 
terous from the face of it. Should the omnipotent 
Father of all not have other means to bring to justice 
His wayward child than by those terrible means rep- 
resented by the orthodox church in which the good 
would suffer perhaps more terribly then the evil? 
Cannot He invent means and ways by which our 
loved ones can be brought to us so that we can assist 
them in their efforts. Indeed! Let each one ask of 
himself whether he can enjoy happiness in heaven if 
he knows that the dearest which he had on earth is 
suffering eternal torments in hell. 

42. Let each one ask himself what he would do, 
if, while seated in heaven, he would hear from below 
the terrible shrieks of his loved one, and hear heart- 
rending agonies. It would be the last of his heaven. 
He would be suffering more than the torments of hell 
in the midst of the angels in heaven. He would call 
upon God for help, and nothing would shake his be- 
lief that God could help no further. Just so would 



59 PATE AND JU8TICB; OB 

pray the martyr in hell. He too, in spite of all 
teachings to the contrary, believes that u God" can 

and will help, and should he have no mercy, when 
even men have the same?— Luke ix, 56. 

Should not lie have mercy, He, who has created 
virtue and taught to love our enemies and to forgive 
one another's faults? Should not He, being perfect, 
be better than we? And should not He find means 
and use them to help his repenting child out of the 
depth of the abyss of suffering? I have the firm 
belief: "Yes!" I nder the laws of common broth- 
erly love and justice God has made it possible to 
deliver the repenting sinner and to give heaven even 
to an unfortunate angel. 

One lover will deliver the other and draw him unto 
himself in order to enjoy heaven united. 

43. The way which God has opened to the heart 
of the repenting in order to earn a higher, purer life, 
is the re-incarnation of the heavy-laden or unde- 
veloped spirits in a new material body. He has an 
opportunity then to begin his life all over again, and 
then to live better than heretofore, to make up for 
time and opportunity wasted, and to redeem and 
reconcile all the suffering and injustice which in a 
former existence he had caused his fellowmen. He is 
a pupil trying to fetch up in the next grade because 
he missed the examination in the highest, and now he 
must commence again at the bottom of the class. 

God does not send anyone of the repenting pupils 
who did not come up with the class, into eternal suf- 
fering and hell. But to the contrary, he sends him 
back to the bottom of the class, that by a repeated 
effort he may gain his proper rank. 

I- not salvation by the truth of re-incarnation 
more in harmony with the wisdom, mercy, love and 
justice of God than the idea of an eternal, flaming 
and roaring hell ] 



THE KEV TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 53 

Why do so many men object to the truth? It 
seems to me that the possibility of a re-incarnation 
ought to be a great consolation to most men. As 
each new existence brings new experiences, so re-in- 
carnation makes progress in knowledge possible. It 
makes both wiser and better. Re-incarnation re- 
conciles all men and furthermore purines in helping 
men to conquer all errors. 

The time to gain purity and perfection through 
various existences is at most but of little duration as 
compared to eternity. An existence of even the long- 
est life-time — of more than three-score years and ten — 
is to the silver locks of age gazing back but like a 
flitting moment at best. 

* As every existence is full of experience, and as 
every existence gathers and collects its experiences to 
the previous one, so it is impossible that re-incarna- 
tion should be retrogression, for, as already said, ex- 
periences are necessarily the cause of knowing. The 
pupil who did not pass his examination does not retro- 
grade because he commences again at the beginning in 
order to at last gain the necessary ability which shall 
land him in the next degree. 

44. There are various causes for re-incarnation. 
The one already mentioned is found in the laziness, 
indifference and waste of time, like the indolent pupil. 
The second cause is to be found in repentance, another 
in the desire of improvement and re-construction. 
Still other incarnations take place in the desire for 
higher developments, and finally there is a re-incarna- 
tion of the highest spirits to special missions for the 
elevation and general improvement of humankind. 
No matter what may be the causes of re-incarnation, 
except the last one mentioned, they all desire to make 
experiences not made before, and improvements of 
some kind. They all work upwards to perfection and 
purity. Step by step man must climb unto certain 



54 i'aik and JUSTICE; OB 

heights. Whoever does not climb as fast as others, 
or who at times stands still, him it takes a longer time 
to gain the height; hut at last he will finally reach it. 

The redemption of the spirits by the sacrifice of 
Christ . as described at the beginning, and His teach- 
ing of the love and fatherhood of God, lifts all of us 
up— not as formerly, on the way of the laio alone, but 
through the love for our enemy — through the help 
from the higher sources— through that which the 
Apostle terms "Grace." 

If the u re-incarnation" were a mere theory and 
not a truth, how then would it be possible to explain 
in a satisfactory manner the great differentiations in 
the characters of men — the manifold kinds of human 
fates and the strange experiences and happenings of 
thousands of human beings, and then to harmonize all 
that with the justice and goodness of God. It is sim- 
ply impossible to find a satisfactory reason for many 
of the happenings wdiich every day transpire around 
us without the knowledge of "re-incarnation." Just 
as impossible is it, without it, to accept the infinite 
justice of God. Considering the great list of crimes 
in human society: robbery, murder, infanticide, abor- 
tion, fraud, boodle, injury, insidiousness, adultery, 
arson, etc., how could they ever be expiated to 
the full measure of justice, except by re-incarna- 
tion? As most crimes committed have injured 
the body of some one, so justice demands that the in- 
jury shall be expiated by a body. If I have to ex- 
piate for a crime like robbery or injury, then I must 
do it as man, since in the spirit world — neither in 
"Heaven" nor in "hell"— there would be no money 
taken as there is no possession. Such crimes cannot 
be redeemed without material bodies, since in the 
spirit world there can be no injury to the parts. The 
spirit cannot be divided nor injured by burning fire. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 55 

It cannot be drowned in the water nor destroyed by 
poison. Any injury is impossible. 

If I take ill-advantage of ray neighbor and rob 
him of his possessions; if I destroy the happiness of 
his family and home, or break the heart of his dear 
one that he shall commit suicide, then I can redeem 
such deeds only as man, in human body, in so far as 
there shall happen to me as I have done unto him. 
u For with what measure ye mete it shall be measured 
to you again." — Matt., vii:l-2. The man who in one 
way or another injures his neighbor, who ignites his 
house, cuts down his trees, or commits other fiendish 
acts, for the sake of making him unhappy, will him- 
self earn the curse — not of necessity now or right 
away — but in some other existence, for in order to re- 
ceive justice he must himself come into the possession 
of such things as w^ere his neighbors, wmether they be 
houses, trees or other material things. Justice de- 
mands it, that you must suffer as you caused some one 
else tO'Svffer — that you must feel as you caused some 
one else to feel. If you insult any one then you shall 
be insulted in turn. If you strike then you w T il' re- 
ceive back the stroke. 

Justice demands the same right for all. No one 
ma}' injure another, not even the smallest injury may 
happen unexpiated. Every ill-spoken word must be 
atoned. You must feel all that you have caused oth- 
er* to feel and suffer cdl which you have caused others 
to suffer. Therefore, says the Lord, and with good 
reason, as he understood the law of justice: "An 
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth," while at the same 
time He reminds us: "But I say unto you that ye re- 
sists not evil — but whosoever shall smite thee on thy 
right cheek, turn to him the other also." — Matt., 
vi, 38. 

Do you know, when either an acquaintance 
or a stranger injures you, that he does not owe it 



:><; i- \ i e \m> justice; or 

to you? Do you know but thai he does not let you 
compensate that moment for evil done to him in some 
former state. 

How docs he know, do you say? Before your 
re-incarnation you gave the right to all your victims 
to pay you back in the same measure — yes. you asked 
it as a favor that they might do it, so that you could 
earn your purity, and at the same time you promised 
to receive all in patience and not to take revenge. 
Yon knew that justice would make all good and pure. 
He does not know it as man. But there are loving 
spirits which go with you and with him and who 
know all and govern all as it must he. If, while 
some one insults or injures us, we would never repeat, 
but bear it patiently, how soon would all humanity 
be happy! Not to resist evil is very difficult for most 
of us. Yet a good and strong character is elevated 
above such smallness. He recognizes it as evil and 
will bear it. He knows if it means compensation for 
him that he does better to take it in silence, and, if it 
is done in injustice, not be as receiver in the guilty 
part, but he who does the ill. He must know that 
justice will and must pay it back, and that the evil-doer 
must suffer the same injury which he now does to 
some one else. He knows that every one condemns 
himself — injures himself. He who believes all this, 
sees all this and knows all this, would be foolish 
indeed should he take revenge upon his perse- 
cutor or accuser, and thus injure himself again, 
and be retarded in his progress. "Vengeance is 
mine." says the Lord, (Rom. xii,19) through the 
law of justice. However difficult it may be to stand 
an insult without repeating it, yet it should not be 
done. ''For the kingdom of Heaven sullereth vio- 
lence, and the violent take it by force." — Matt. xi,12. 
tie who does not repeat the injury is the stronger. 
He who is high tempered and repeats it is the coward 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 57 

in the true sense of the term, as he does not possess 
the will to be strong in spirit. He cannot bear either 
a justice nor an injury. 

45. If we consider some of the crimes and in- 
juries which men commit toward or upon each other, 
without feeling-, sympathy or compassion, and then 
think what justice will do to cleanse them from such 
deeds, it may be difficult to see how that can be done. 
But at best it cannot take eternity, not as long as the 
old hell which burns forever and ever. Whenever the 
law of justice has been reconciled by redemption then 
the soul feels the light wings of freedom — free, free! 

If we had no chance of expiation and then to be- 
come free, then there would remain to us only hatred 
(pp. 14-15) hatred and increased hatred instead of union 
and love. There where hatred dwells is the home of 
hell, out of which redemption has liberated us. From 
the dominions of earth as well as the spheres of the 
spirit world hatred must disappear to make room for 
love, and this by means of a universal reconciliation. 
This reconciliation is the w T onderful work of Jesus 
Christ, founded upon his love to his lower brethren 
and children of the one Father of all. 

It is his work, because through his life, his deeds, 
his suffering and death he has opened to the rest of 
higher spirits the way to reconciliation and to a com- 
mon brotherhood. He pointed out the duties of one 
towards another, and that love towards those upon a 
lower stage of life and mutual helpfulness were the 
true ways to progress, and the only way to heavenly 
harmony. How wonderfully high is the great work 
of Christ and how true, how true, are his teachings — 
but how much are his words rids understood. 

Instead of making a science out of the teachings 
of Christ — a science of the true way of life, a sci- 
ence of natural law and natural justice — the world has 
twisted his revelations into falsehoods and terrors, 



r a i i: and JUSTICE; OR 

and his religion into meaningless ceremonials and un- 
truths. 

The science of justice and re-incarnation will again 
raise up the lost, and show to the world the teachings 
of Christ in a new light. Creeds and dogmas, decep- 
tions, hypocrisy and innumerable errors and vices 
will cease, to make room for the good and the true 
and the beautiful and the lovable in a universal broth- 
erhood — the kingdom of Christ or the kingdom of 
Grod upon earth. 

4:6. This is the true kingdom of Heaven, where 
we shall he a race of brothers, and it must come! 
Then there will be no more crime nor deception, no 
more misery and poverty and want; for all the world 
will live in harmony, each for the other. Such will be 
the result of the re-incarnation and the common re- 
conciliation. Rev. xxi,3-4. 

All those of us, who accept this reconciliation in 
justice without seeking revenge shall receive 1 that 
heavenly peace. u He that overcometh shall inherit 
all things; and I will be his God and he shall be my 
son." — Rev., xxi,7. 

Before, however, that time approaches a right 
judgment must be passed over the world. Deception 
and crime, corruption, horror and selfishness must 
vanish. Justice must take its v,-a} r over the nations 
and the individuals, and all crime must have been 
atoned for. Purity must have been created and love 
must reign. 

Already the great day of judgment and atone- 
ment is dawning and will continue to brighten until all 
has been clear and the beams of the sun of love have 
reached the innermost corner of the human heart. 

47. lie who does not believe it may take the 
trouble to trace the course of the world in the news- 
papers of our day, cast away prejudice and the belief 
in •'chance." Whoever follows the course of daily 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 0$ 

events cannot pass over it without thinking: Is it 
really accident or has the hand of God brought it 
about, and why? Why all these terrible catastro- 
phies, storms and blizzards and floods and other 
natural calamities and disasters which demanded 
thousands of human victims. If all such are the will 
of God, which has been proven by what was said 
before, and when the forces of nature are at his com- 
mand, resting in his hand, then we must come to the 
conclusion that He leads in harmouj^ the natural laws 
and the fates of men. Many a time, in the midst of 
disaster, there will occur a miracle to show to us that 
indeed there is a higher hand governing and guiding 
the event. So here I read of an event during the 
catastrophe of Johnstown, Pa., which was wit- 
nessed by hundreds of people. It is a telegram 
reported by the Associated Press: 

"At the church of the 'Unspotted Conception,' 
cared over by the Rev. Father Trautwein, at Cambria 
City, when the flood came on Friday it was about 
time of the close of the May service. The church 
was filled with worshippers who hastened out upon 
the street as they heard the noise of the rushing 
waters. Within a few minutes the water stood fifteen 
feet high in the church and ran with terrible force into 
every corner. The church suffered great damage. 
The pews were broken and the building itself was in- 
jured both inside and out. When on Monday morn- 
ing, through the broken door, people entered the 
church it seemed as though there was nothing left un- 
injured. People were not a little surprised to find a 
statue of the Virgin Mary, which had been decorated 
with flowers on account of the May service, undis- 
turbed. The flowers, the wreaths and even the veil 
were fully undisturbed and not in the least dirty. 
Traces upon the wall showed that the water had stood 
fifteen feet high. Every one who saw the statue 



60 



PATE AM) JUSTICE; OK 



was convinced of the strangeness of the occurrence, 
and that there was no natural way by which to account 
for the same There are many "people who will tes- 
tify to the truth of this." 

No one will believe that this miracle occurred for 
the sake of saving the statue, but rather to show 
that there is existing a power greater than the raging 
elements, as in the time of the "Three men in the 
fiery oven, "which were kept alive in the midsts of 
the flame. This all-wise and great power knew that 
such a rain as the one at Johnstown would happen, 
break the dam and destroy hundreds of people, and 
could, if it desired, have saved all that life. But it 
was the will of God and he must be absolutely just, 
and the cause for such destruction must be found 
somewhere else rather than in mere "chance." When 
we consider that we have lived before, and that we 
are led by a high hand in order to atone for wrong 
done in a former life, then nothing more can be said 
about chance. 

Men who as in this case, are destroyed together, 
are related spirits, and they thus atone together for 
some deeds which they committed in a former condi- 
tion. Providence brings them together under the 
same fate. They have been murderers, usurers and 
frauds, and when the time came that the}% as spirits, 
repented, they received the £race of atonement and 
were permitted to re-incarnate, in order to lose their 
homes and their lives.— Matt., vii,2. 

They knew, before their re-incarnation, what 
would happen to them upon earth, and now, as they 
have paid off at least a part of their sins, they are 
easier and purer and higher. Their next incarnation 
expiates and atones for another sin and so forth 
until absolute purity. Every re-incarnation is a step 
onward towards purifying and ennobling the soul, and 
towards eternal harmonic brotherhood. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 61 

There is no reason therefore that any one should 
be discouraged. We shall all reach that end, but as 
we know that justice must follow every action, we 
ought carefully avoid every sin toward one another, 
as: We do if unto ourselves. God give that we shall 
soon come to see that in the right light! What a step 
that would be in the line of progression, and a true 
fulfillment of the angel's words: "Peace on earth — 
good will to man." 

48. O, how terribly will we suffer until we have 
atoned for all the fraud, robbery, usury and ill-advan- 
tage which fills the world to-day. How many there 
are who study even the noblest sciences and arts, not 
for the sake of these, but rather that they can, by 
means of these take advantage of their fellow being — 
that thev can rob them in an indirect way and thus 
store up treasures for themselves. To intelligent 
or smart men or to rich men it is double sin to 
use their talent for the sake of taking advantage of their 
wealth for usury, rather than to apply their talents or 
thier wealth for the best of their kind. Selfishness is 
the greatest of all evils of all crime. The owner of 
wealth and property, who rents his possessions to the 
poor, and who in time when age or misery overtake 
people evicts the same from his home, although the 
same people may have labored for him honestly and 
paid him regularly, he is truly evil at heart and a fit 
illustration of the selfishness that is the meanest of 
crime. Woe unto him when justice demands expiation 
and reconciliation from him. The poor old couple 
evicted left their old home, tears in their eyes. Sick 
and in want, they are beggars, and in old age exposed 
to the sufferings of necessity. The man soon dies of 
exposure, while his wife finds acceptance at the poor- 
house. Is not the rich man to blame for the suffering 
which befell them \ His unlimited selfishness — 
avarice — broke the hearts of these poor when he cast 



S2 PATE AND .11 8TICE; OB 

them out. Our laws have no way to reach bad men 
of this kind, although they are worse than murderers 
and wear the garb of good society. But when at adis- 
ant day with his book of life he steps before the great 
judge of all, then he has to give an account of every 
act of his life, of every talent received. Then before 
him there will rise the deeds of his life in terrible letters 
and tile complaint. How will it be with him and how 
crushed must he feel as all his life lies not only be- 
fore God, but before every good spirit and be- 
fore his victims. "For there is nothing covered 
that shall not be revealed." Luke xii,i2. And from 
the distance he will hear a voice: "Away, away, 
I know you not." The sins and vices to which 
he had sacrificed his Jife, they are the weight 
which now drags him down according to the law 
of moral gravity — he is a bad spirit, for his soul 
is bad and impure and there is no redemption out 
of his own lawful misery until by his own effort 
he lias improved so much that he learns to pray. His 
prayer then is his first step towards progress of his 
soul and soon he will weep and complain and ask for- 
giveness. If he is in earnest, he will, crouching, ask 
forgiveness of his victims. As soon as his victims 
hear him and approach him, then his salvation is 
near, and he will be permitted, after clear considera- 
tion and according to his own choice, to enter a new 
existence in a new body. Whatever fate hangs over 
him in his new existence is demanded by justice as an 
atonement for the ills perpetrated by him in his 
former life. 

Damnation, i. <?., cast out from all that is good 
and elevating, is an eternity for him until redemption 
approaches, as he does not know whether or when it 
is going to come. He can see no end to his condition 
and there will be no end as long as he does not deserve 
it. Therefore the Bible speaks of eternal damnation. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 63 

Salvation must, like every other progress, be the re-. 
suit of one's own effort, as in that way alone can jus- 
tice be done. There are no preferences shown. Xot 
even one. Justice is and must be the same in each in- 
dividual case or it would cease to be justice. Like- 
wise in case of re-incarnation, it cannot be permitted 
to one to re-enter the school of life for higher perfec- 
tion and not to another. It cannot be permitted to 
one to overreach the steps to Heaven, while another 
one, who is as willing as he, and has no more errors, 
must atone for the same upon earth. Justice deals 
alike with all. Here lies the power of that doctrine 
in bringing happiness to men, in making men feel 
that there is no one lost, that all, according to the 
amount of their effort, sooner or later, will reach the 
destined glory, that every soul is destined to climb 
upon the stairs of development until perfection has 
been gained. 

Justice is the same to all, and how happy does it 
make us feel, that each one of us according to our 
own effort and dilligence can reach the high state of 
blessedness, that all of us are destined to progress 
through the law, and that, through the law of re-in- 
carnation, it brings us the certainty of becoming a race 
of united brothers. 

49. Compared to this how terrible was the old 
belief, that sinful men, who had not received baptism 
through one church or another, after his bodily death 
would burn eternally in a hell of fire and brimstone! 
How terrible to consider such a God, who after train- 
ing his children up in intelligence that they may see, 
learn, understand and think, takes the same, after 
they are on a fair way of becoming good, and 
cast them into eternal hell! Yet had he, himself, 
made man with all his faults, made him like man 
would make an earthen vessel, except that God put 
feeling and intelligence into his work, and then ac- 



B 



M PATE and JUSTICE; OB 

cording to the teachings of the church he cast his 
into outer darkness. 

50. Considering the testimony of Jesus Christ 
what a high and noble idea lie presented to us in re- 
gard to God, as the Father of all, whose very love 
and justice extended down to the lowest of beings and 
how long has it taken us to understand or compre- 
hend Him. The religion which commands us to 
Wk Love our neighbor as ourselves," to "Love our ene- 
mies —how could such religion teach hatred and eter- 
nal damnation of the children of God, thus lowering 
God under man. And not in words alone has the 
Lord given us His religion, but in verv deed has he 
set an example before us that we may follow Him. Is 
not the incarnation which he brought to us more in 
harmony with goodness and mercy of God than eter- 
nal hell? The spirit, pressed down with evil, why 
should not it rather pass through another existence 
where it can repent and atone, than to roast eternally? 

51. It might seem strange that men desire "to 
get old, very old; that it pleases them so well to live 
upon this earth, and yet few desire to become young 
again. Do they fear death, or do they fear to be re- 
born ( Death need not be a terror to anyone. It is 
but the casting off of an old garment, the throwing 
aside of a worn-out tool. Every night as we <r to 
sleep we experience a sample thereof. In sleep the 
soul leaves the body and enters the world of spirits 
and only the spirit, i. <?., the body of the soul, remains 
in the material body. The spirit penetrates the body 
in all directions so that it has the form of the body 
as we have said before (§2, 3). Sleep, therefore, is only 
half death. At death proper the soul with its body 

Hie spirit) leaves the material body (the flesh) and is 
independent — 1 Cor. xv,40-51. He who does not fear 
death need not fear re-incarnation as, being youno- 
again, it offers another opportunity to man^to learn 
and to be loved. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. G5 

"Verily, verily. I say unto thee, unless a man be 
born again, be shall in no wise enter into the King- 
dom of Heaven. — John, iii:3. I believe that the fear 
of a re-birth is due merely to a misapprehension and 
ignorance in regard to the advantage and progress. 
When the time arrives that we stand before the great 
judge of the Universe and feel the weight of our neg- 
lect and our impurity, there can be no doubt but that 
we will reason differentl} 7 and joyfully and anxiously 
look forward to the day of re-incarnation. We will 
then promise from the depths of our. heart to do bet- 
ter. To the heavily burdened spirit the re-incarnation 
can be but joy. 

Our merciless rich man who ejected the poor old 
couple, knows therefore, before his re-incarnation, 
what fate, according to justice, he must expect in the 
next existence. It is a fortune for him, however, that 
his new body does not know it — or it would be before 
him all his days and rob him of his peace. The wis- 
dom of God, however, knows it, and therefore it 
must be thus. 

52. Let each one ask himself how he would fepl 
did he possess any fore-knowledge about his destiny. 
He would surety not use as much energy of life, hut 
would rather waste his time in indolence and despair. 
His coming fate would always stand before him and 
he would light against it. It would stop all strife, 
ambition and progress in the earth and fill the minds 
of men with supreme indifference, especially if 
men could foresee that what ever they gained 
or built would be destroyed by fire or flood 
or that at any certain hour they themselves 
would be cut off from the stage of strife. The 
man who would know that he should fall in bat- 
tle would never enter a war — he who knows he should 
fall from a precipice would never climb a mountain, 
nor would he ever 20 in bathinsr who foreknew that 



FATE and JUSTICE; OB 

he should be drowned. The providence of God 1ms 
ordered all things id wisdom and it ought not lake us 
wonder therefore, that we do not remember anything 
of our former existence. s 

Our rich man had the weak side, while living in 
wealth, to be heartless, avaricious and haughty, there- 
fore he selected another existence with wealth, under 
which he will be tested and atone for his former faults 
As he was on the best way, fate and misfortune came 
over him. His house and home were swept away by 
the flood, llis money he lost in unfortunate specu- 
lation, and while he himself was saved out of the flood 
he was saved a beggar. Although his haughtiness 
has not yet fully left him, yet he must now, like other 
people, earn his daily bread in the sweat of his brow 
and driven from placeto place he finally succumbs to 
exposure m mid winter. He has atoned and again he 
stands before the judge, but this time with more ioy 
and with greater hope. Likewise has he risen in the 
degree and rank of the spirits. Time and suffering in 
the short time on earth were nothing as compared to 
the progress which he has gained thereby. 

Retrogression through a new incarnation is im- 
possible, as every existence has its own experiences 
winch gather to all those already attained during a 
former state of being. Besides that retrogression 
would be against the plan of providence, which insti- 
tuted reincarnation for the salvation of humankind. 
Without re-incarnation it would be impossible to con- 
ceive of justice— a just redemption, a purifying, a 
true brotherhood— love towards enemies and in fact 
true progress, and last but not least, perfection itself. 
After re-mcarnation has finished its end upon this 
earth then it is continued upon some higher and more 
perfect planet. 

53. There is nothing either in logic or in reason 
nor any theory whatever, which throws light upon the 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 6? 

manifold ways and destinies of humankind as onty 
and alone re-incarnation. That "chance" should 
lead and guide all things is still more against the com- 
prehension of man than the idea of providence, or 
spirit guidance. Things happen according to more 
order, with more precision and intelligence than that 
we can place or account for all by "blind" chance. 
A "chance" at best can be nothing else but something 
happening by circumstances, which meeting each other 
have an effect, and which would be blind and without 
any intelligent guidance. We have, until our day, 
seen nothing but results or effects of such circum- 
stances, and as in our research we do not ahv^rys go 
to the bottom of things, we call them simply "chance." 
Should we. however, test the various circumstances, 
and look for the end or purpose of the effect, we 
should come to the conclusion that the circumstances 
were indeed in the hand of an intelligence, which at 
times brought the same together with mathematical 
precision, so that they happened because they must. 
If a person climbs a tree and, falling, breaks an arm, 
then we see at once the effect of the fall. The climb- 
ing, however, is not the cause of the fall, yet in it 
there was merely the possibility. For indeed the 
person had to climb before he could fall, and we may 
therefore call it mere blind chance or carelessness that 
he fell and broke his arm. We see all that with our 
own eyes and we find it unnecessaiy thus far to search 
for any other reason. Justice, however, breaks no 
arm without cause, nor causes man pain undeserved. 
To climb the tree merely for the sake of climbing can- 
not have been anything wrong in itself and to break 
an arm or a leg would therefore be an injustice. The 
person who, by such a fall, broke his arm, must have 
deserved it. This case was merely an expiation, 
which as the time arrived was brought about in such a 
way that he was stopped in his labor, or as even it 



68 



PATE AM) JUSTICE; OB 



might have been, thai he was so led, as to o-et to i 
tree which upon order or self-will, he climbed. Then 
the immediate cause, dizziness, or whatever may have 
Jed to it, was brought about by the same power. 

I knew a young man about twenty years of ao- 
who lived upon a hill in my Tillage, near a large pond. 
After dinner he laid down for a little nap, and after 
awaking he rubbed his eyes and said: "0, I am still 
here— I thought I was dead!" 

"What is the matter, Sam, have you dreamed?" 
said his mother. "Yes, mother, I dreamed that I was 
bathing in the pond, there. I seemed to oet very 
heavy in every bone, so that I could not move and I 
got drowned. There were only four little boys and 
they could not help me. I am glad that it was only a 
dream. I thought surely that 1 was dead—such a 
foolish dream. 

After a while— so tells his mother— Sam said- "I 
believe I will go in bathing. It is so warm; I feel 
like it." 

But his mother tried to dissuade him. He how- 
ever sneered at her fear as foolishness and went. 

Half an hour later four boys came running to the 
house and told her that Sam T. had just been drowned 
in the pond. As they fetched him out of the pond 
they found that he stood upright in a deep place in 
the pond, yet only four feet wide, and the water was 
only about a foot above his head. 

What do we say to this little, but true story? 
Had the young man not said anything to his mother 
regarding his dream, then this drowning would have 
been looked upon as mere chance, and by chance he 
would have gotten stuck in the hole and drowned. 
But m this case there can be no talk about chance at 
all. In the destination his death by drowning must 
have been determined upon, and by dreaming it in all 
its details, it was given as a lesson to others that man's 
fate is unchangeably determined. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 69 

Now. the question will naturally occur to us: 
" Why should he be drowned by the determination 
of God? Here is a similar case reported from Kansas 
City, October 16, 1891: "Monday morning Mrs. 
Samuel Harrington said she dreamed that Jimmie, 
her brother-in-law. had been cat in two by the cars. 
She begged Jimmie not to go to work in the yards, 
but he laughed at her. To-day, he was coupling 
cars at the Kock Island yards and he fell and was run 
over and cut in two just as his sister-in-law saw in 
her dream." 

We must not forget that God is just and can do 
no wrong. If I can connect justice in the case of the 
history of the drowned man, so I receive about the 
following story in regard to his former existence: 
He had. in his former existence, some relations in 
which some one was in his way, and likely four per- 
sons in all, which in some way became his victims. 
He drowned them in so far as he let them in an up- 
right position slide into the deep, tied, perhaps, and 
with weights attached to their feet. That must have 
been about the sensation of his victims, which he felt 
without being tied. If there have been four of the 
unfortunate, then for each of the four he will have to 
reincarnate himself. Whoever commits more than 
one murder, owes, of course, for more than one, 
and must, in • order to satisfy justice, expiate each 
one. How many men there are still to-day who have 
great numbers of murders upon their conscience? 
Woe unto them. They have good cause to tremble. 
They have done it all unto themselves! "An eye for 
an eye, a tooth for a tooth." — Matt., v, 3S. 

54. Let us read the following newspaper clip- 
ping and let us consider, in the light of justice, 
whether that brutish female really expiated for the 
terror of her deeds by merely receiving the judgment 
which a jury can impart. 



FATE AM) JUSTICE; OR 



On the 2nd of August, 1888, thero opened before 
the courts of Hradish, Hungary, the case of the State 
against Franziska Kovalde, from Kortelccz, accused 
of four cases of murder. About the middle of Jan- 
uary of last year Franziska Kovalde killed her. 19- 
year-old daughter, Franziska, and buried her body 
in the basement of her house. The disappearance of 
the gir] caused a little surprise, since three years pre- 
viously her son of 14 was found dead in the garden 
and shortly afterwards her husband disappeared. At 
that time people manifested a great deal of sympathy 
towards the woman, because she complained that now 
her husband had become faithless and left her in dis- 
tress. After a while she sold the tools and the gar- 
ments of her husband, and acted as though she Ivas 
assured that he could not return. This caused sus- 
picion, and people began to remember that years a^o 
her first husband had disappeared in the same way. 
The police now took up the case and it was proven 
that in Vienna there was no Franziska Kovalde, so 
that her daughter likewise had disappeared. Now 
the police went to work in earnest, and the woman 
confessed that she had killed her daughter with a club. 
In searching the house they discovered buried in the 
cellar a box three feet long which contained the skele- 
ton of a female corpse that might have been there 
about a year and a half. A large crowd was present 
in the halls of justice to listen to the trial. The ac- 
cused defended herself the first day in saying that she 
had had trouble with her daughter and killed her in a 
moment of excitement. On the second day, however, 
-he denied that and said that her second husband had 
fled to the United States but one day had returned 
very unexpectedly. He had then killed the girl and 
returned to the United States. She denied absolutely 
having killed her husband and her son. The exami- 
nation of the witnesses was very exciting, and more 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 71 

so the relating of the finding of the skeleton by the 
police. Two questions were laid before the jury. 
They affirmed unanimously that the woman had killed 
her daughter, but denied that she had done so out of 
a mean purpose. Franziska Kovalde was sentenced 
to be hung. Indifferently the inhuman woman received 
the sentence and left the courtroom with a smile upon 
her face.'' 

So, after she had killed her son, her daughter and 
her two husbands, she was sentenced by the court to 
suffer only one death, that by hanging, and not then 
in the measure in which she had imparted death, and, 
besides, without repentance. 

Three more, and the fourth one unreconciled 
wait upon her. Shall she not suffer for them ? Will the 
rest of the murdered ones be contented thus with 
their mother or respective wife, who, in a spell of ex- 
citement or hatred, killed them 8 

Every one of my readers will say: No, they 
will want revenge! Can they get that? Yes — cast 
her into hell. That is where she belongs! 

But, no! The Lord set us an example to love 
our enemies, and therefore none should demand more 
than what is just. 

They will all use every effort of word and exam- 
ple to cause the spirit of the murderer to see and re- 
pent, after which there is nothing in the way of her 
re-incarnation. 

How is it possible, we say now, that justice can 
be dealt out to this woman, that she shall feel as her 
victims felt, and at the same time to satisfy them, ex- 
cept by the way of re-incarnation? Does not she 
need a material body in order to feel and experience 
the same pains which she caused her victims, to feel? 

People do not improve by preaching and talking 
to them as much as by suffering and experience, and 
this cannot be brought about except upon a materi: I 



1 ATI. AM) JU8TICE: OK' 



body. In order to atone for three murders, there 
must be three existences. 

The fate of the woman in question is therefore 
determined ahead for three distinct existences, and 
during those three existences there may many other 
things happen which will add to her old" faults The 
existence of a being like her cannot he of an easy 
nature, since misfortune and great sufferings are the 
only means to bring about her development/ Or have 
we ever seen, that possession and health have brought 
.-real improvement to a spirit which was not already 
advanced? No. It is the reverse which brings im- 
provement. The love of her victims for her becomes 
her salvation only if they themselves are advanced 
spirits, which undertand the act of salvation. Other- 
wise she would have to remain in her darkness until 
her victims are so far advanced and thus enabled to 
assist her which it might take hundreds of years to 
accomplish. Her victims in fact mio-ht need more ex- 
istences themselves, until they had reached the condi- 
tions m which they would be able to bring her any hell) 
but of course these, too, have their friends and dear 
ones who care for them and try to help them on. 

55. All humanity is linked together like a chain. 
" e are all connected by the evil which we have done 
towards one another, but likewise through Love! We 
are all brothers— sisters— fathers and 'mothers. Or 
do you know who was your loved one in a former 
stage* Do you know who in that stage was your 
mother, your sister or your friend? Our fate gener- 
ally brings people together who in former existence 
were connected by blood and who thus are under obli- 
gations to one another. This accounts for many unex- 
piamable and strange love stories, how in a wonderful 
way two people can find each other and belong to- 
gether. W e frequently hear of cases how two lovers 
have thus been brought togetherin a strange way or 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. ,3 

as we are apt to say it: " A strange chance brought 
them together." AVonderful this would be indeed, if 
mere blind chance had brought all this about, but so 
much the more cause there is to believe that it is all 
the work of Providence; that in fact there are spirit 
guides who watch over our fates and who are respon- 
sible for the strange wa} T s in which things come about. 
Besides these very strange, there are sometimes 
very sympathetic so-called "chances," in which a 
thinking man can at once see .the hand of fate. " 
These are mostly happenings of such a nature and 
brought about in such a strange and remarkable way 
that almost always the highest feeling of the human- 
breast plays the main part, so much so that even the 
disinterested ones are often moved to tears, and not 
seldom there rise from the lips of strangers even 
offerings of praise to the Lord above, TTho leads every- 
thing to His great ends. So in the innermost being 
man comes to feel the providence of God and ex- 
claims: O, Lord, Thy works are marvellous and 
Thou leadest the world in a wonderful way!" Let us 
for instance read a number of the pretty Christmas 
stories and we shall find to our surprise that most of 
them have been written after actual occurrences, i.e., 
they are true, and the only additions are the nourishes 
of the author. Nevertheless, the authors of those 
little stones must feel in their innermost consciousness, 
or premonition, that there is a guiding hand of fate. 

I will ask the reader to read these little stories 
wherever he may find them, and then to compare the 
same with what I have just now said, and he will find 
to his satisfaction how closely connected is the provi- 
dence of God with justice aud with our destined fate. 

Almost every man, if he thinks over the past, 
will find how, in his own life, many strange things 
have happened together. 

56. For everyone lives under the law of his own 



i 1 FATE AM) ,)l MICK: OB 

fate, because it is the result of bis former life. The 
fate of his body is led from above. The spiritual life, 
however, is depending upon man's free will, or else 
there would be no responsibility, since the judgment 
depends upon the will and moral condition of the soul 
alone. However the soul is so its organ, the body 
will be created. As the material body is the tool of 
the soid, through which it acts, so we judsre it accord- 
ing to its external appearance and not according to its 
motives. And it is commonly the case that men do 
things which deeds of themselves are falsehoods and 
hypocrisy! Whenever the soul itself is fornication 
and lies, then the body will practice fraud and hypoc- 
risy towards its neighbor. Men judge one another 
according to their external behavior, and an honest man 
who does not understand hypocrisy is being greatly 
misled, so that he may never have a chance to know 
whence his misfortune. But at the throne of God the 
soul will not be judged according to its external ap- 
pearance, but according to its innermost will. 

If we say: Judged before God, or the judgment 
seat of God, then we mean that judgment will be 
brought about through the laws of God. If God has 
made laws for the purpose, then it is naturally like 
standing before the judgment seat of God. 

The judgment of God according to which every 
man is judged is the judgment of self. 

57. When at the transition from the material to 
to the spiritual life the soul steps before God and the 
spirits, presenting his book of life, in which every act 
has been recorded, then judgment has been passed al- 
ready. The laws of moral gravity draw every act 
with themselves into the deep from which the soul 
cannot rise until it has become more pure and light. 
The church insists that it is then too late. Yes, it is 
too late. The soul can rise; no more, but is doomed to 
remain in the deep, which may well be like the tor- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. ?0 

ments of hell to those who see the evil of their ways. 
Alone and deserted, cut off from all nobler intercourse 
of society, without hope of improvement — hated and 
despised, the soul wanders about dragged in the 
whirlpool by an evil power to eternal damnation. 
Eternal hell and damnation, the Bible says, and to the 
suffering soul it is a reality, since the great mission 
and atonement of Christ is not understood. The vic- 
tims of the spirit thus troubled must first rise and 
purify themselves and understand the redemption of 
Christ in its entirety, before they are able to bring re- 
demption to the spirit in bondage. After this has 
been accomplished, which may take a period of hun- 
dreds of years, and after the spirit thus tried suffers 
deep felt repentance, then his victims under the law 
of love, may love their enemy, and draw him unto 
them. They will then forgive him under the law of 
justice and reconciliation. The suffering spirit be- 
comes re-incarnated, his former victim, now his 
friend, becomes his spirit guide, who leads him on to 
his fate. 

In his love and parental care God has given to 
the spirits as well as to man, the means and ways, to 
approach him by the law. It is left to the advance of 
their intelligence to find and take advantage of the 
same. 

58. I think it was in the fall of 18S-, at Hatte, 
Kan., while busy in a field threshing wheat with a 
steam thresher, that the man who feeds the machine 
committed a terrible crime upon a 16-year-old boy. 
The boy was cutting the twine in two as the bundles 
fell upon the machine, and was not sufficiently quick 
for the man, who, after the strings had been cut, 
pushes the wheat into the machine, so that several 
times he threatened and cursed the boy. The boy 
could make nothing right to him, when all at once, in 
a fit of rage, he caught the boy and pushed him into 



76 FATE AND JU8TICB; OB 

the machine. While the boy was torn into a thou- 
sand pieces, and before the people realized what had 
happened, the murderer had fled, and has not been 
caught up to the time of this writing. Yet that does 
not alter the ease. He cannot escape his just punish- 
ment, though had he been caught and even lynched 
by an enraged community, } r et the mere hanging to a 
tree would have been no equal expiation for the crime 
which he had committed. For a mob law at very 
best cannot bring a soul to repentance, and it would 
have been nothing but a common case of murder on 
the part of the mob. For a mob judges in a rage 
and in ignorance. Even the civil laws and state laws 
are frequently unjust and imperfect. Therefore, says 
the Lord: "Vengeance is mine." The murderer 
may have been an otherwise agreeable man and have 
had many good sides of his own, w T ith the exception 
of a high temper. In that one moment of rage in 
which his temper became the master of his better self, 
he did the most terrible of crimes. If he is only a 
normally developed spiritual man, even then he will 
commence to suffer terribly, from the very moment 
when he committed the deed. He will suffer a hell 
of his soul in a living body until, as we say, death 
Bteps in to free him. The truth is, however, that now 
his real suffering commences, until the spirit of the 
boy whom he wronged, frees him from the bondage 
of such pain. The boy frees him in so far as he 
accepts him and becomes his spirit guide for his next 
existence. If the spirit of the murderer is in deep 
earnest, then he will receive the just reconciliation 
with joy and he will atone for the deed committed 
upon that boy by being reincarnated. 

His new flesh, or better, his new brain knows no 
more of all that which he did during his former ex- 
istence. He goes his way through life, not knowing, 
and indifferent as to coming events. Whatever may 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 7. 

be his aim in life lie will follow it to the content of 
his heart and the fulfillment of his will and his wishes, 
until he meets his fate. 

Many years he worked in a powder magazine: he 
is a skillful and careful workinginan; there his hour 
arrives and an explosion tears his body into a thou- 
sand pieces. There are many means and conditions 
into which so-called "chance" can lead him where he 
feels that he must suffer as his spirit guide has suf- 
fered. Here and there men are torn to pieces even by 
animals or sharks. What crime may not the young 
mau Robert, of whom I spoke on pages 61-62, have 
committed in his previous life, that he should burn so 
terribly and die in a few days? What was the cause 
of his suffering that they should satisfy justice? 

History tells us of barbaric slavemasters who 
treated their slaves in a brutal way. To have cast a 
slave into a camp fire, for instance, while in a state of 
rage, would perhaps be justly punished and recon- 
ciled by the sufferings of that young man. 

A man who commits murder while in a rage 
may not be real bad at heart. In fact, his crime is 
less low than though it had been premeditated and 
planned upon his victim. By proper treatment in a 
reformatory institution he may still become a better 
and even nobler man, since his rage may be nothing 
more nor less than a disease. Instead of being cured 
of that disease, he is the first one over whom the court 
pronounces a sentence, "Guilty of murder in the 
first degree." The judgment of man is proportioned 
according to the external appearance of the deed. 
Therefore, judgment by the hand of men, be this pen- 
itentiary or capital punishment, ought not to take 
place, and all our aim ought to be in the direction of 
reformation for the criminal. 

God's judgment, or the natural law, judges only 
according to the understanding and intention of the 



78 1 A IT. AND .11 STICK: OB 

soul. Our whole system of criminal law is based 
upon revenge rather than upon love. Let us draw 
our lower brethren unto us. Let their weakness be 
improved by our institutions. Let us cut off their 
wild tendencies and graft healthy buds into their 
trunks! What right have we for revenge? We know 
that only the improved man is accepted to reconcilia- 
tion and that he must atone for his evil deeds in the 
way of justice. 

59. Let us help one another in brotherly love. 
Let us not judge unjustly in order that we may not 
be treated in the same manner, for everything is 
justice and the law of nature is "a tooth for a tooth." 
We must not act revengefully towards one another, for 
our relation to each other is not onty that of man to 
man, but that of brother to brother. The destiny of 
a higher humanity is this, that we should love one an- 
ther and assist one another, without consideration of 
rank, unto the ever higher spheres of life. That is 
the religion, or the practical knowledge and under- 
standing of the teachings of Jesus Christ: "Human- 
ity, love thy neighbor as thyself !" 

What right have we to revenge and judgment 
over our brother, since God reserves vengeance unto 
himself ? He is the personification of wisdom. He 

beyond the apparent into the real cause, and will, 
therefore, mete out his judgment in the way in which 
it is deserved and needed. We act according to the 
bare appearance of things — hence in pronouncing 
judgment over the deeds of our neighbors we are apt 
to err. God in his laws, however, is just and judges 
according to the intentions of the soul. 

bo. And, furthermore, do we know but that at 
times Providence sends judgment over one man by 
means of another, using the one merely as a tool to 
accomplish his end? Cannot the hand of man be led 
by a higher power than his own will or understand- 
ing I 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEIXG. 79 

It is six or seven years ago, when the newspapers 
reported the case of a sentinel who, standing guard, 
all at once lowered his gun and killed a man who stood 
before the window in the third story of a building 
upon the opposite side of the street, after which he 
again shouldered his gun and marched as he had done 
before the prescribed steps up and down the street, 
as though nothing had happened. When he was ar- 
rested and asked about the deed he absolutely denied 
it. Although his gun was still smoking, and while he 
had been seen by a number of witnesses he insisted 
that he had no recollection of having done such a deed. 
Even before the court he insisted that he knew noth- 
ing at all about it. What the court-martial did in his 
case I have never been able to learn. I cannot even 
guarantee the truth of the stoiy, having read it in the 
papers merely, yet it is possible that it is true. There 
is nothing strange in the matter and, according to my 
view, and every claj .there happen occur- 
rences through innocent little children, for which 
we account in a way as carelessness or ignorance, and 
then call it chance, as in the playino- with loaded 
weapons and the accidental discharge of the same, and 
throuo-h which persons may become crippled or even 
killed. The higher power leads and guides the inno- 
cent and thus brings about atonement through the 
very hand of man. 

The soldier in Berlin who killed the man across 
the street, in a former existence was the victim of the 
man whom he killed. He then killed the one whom 
we have now before us as a soldier, and the soldier has 
not been given him along as a spirit guide, but as man. 
and so they live together in the same city. The spirit 
guide of the soldier and the one belonging to the man 
at the window know each other, hence vengeance and 
atonement and reconciliation came about by the very 
hand of his former victim. The soldier must not know 



v i> l \ II. AM) JD8TICE; OB 

anything about it. or the worldly powers would pro- 
nounce an unjust judgment over him, and Providence 
could not permit it since he was not under such a 
debt. Here, too, the words find application: "A tooth 

for a tooth— a life for a life!" And "With what 
measure ve mete it shall be measured to you againl" 
Matt. 7.) 

61. That Providence takes vengeance through 
innocence is wonderfully shown in the following ease, 
which as it tends to explain the above more fully, I 
will repeat here. The attorney for the defense uses 
essentially the same argument which I have here illus- 
trated, namely, the justice before God. The story 
which appears under the title, "Before the Jury,-' 
and has been written by Erwin Bauer, is as follows: 

"The attorney for the state had just finished his 
argument. Slowly he took his seat and cast a glance 
over the court room, to see what effect his words had 
made upon the public. All of Odessa seemed to be 
crowded into the small court hall. Face on face worn 
with terrible excitement, they formed a mass like a 
wall reaching up to the ceiling. And it seemed silent 
and without life like a wall. There was no sound to 
be heard, — not even after the prosecution had said his 
last word. With a feeling of sadness the jury dropped 
their white heads; earnestly the judges gazed before 
them, the stenographers rested their tired hands, while 
the crowd, which seemed to be united in only one liv- 
ing being, directed its large gaze towards the bench of 
the accused. Upon that bench there sat, immovable, 
Pawel Lartschenko; he carried his tall figure almost 
arrow-like; his arms folded before him. a deep silence 
and earnestness was impressed upon his young and 
beautiful face, while his eyes looked with determina- 
tion towards the judges. 

Slowly the attorney for the defense arose and 
said: 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 81 

"Gentlemen of the jury: The highest justice is 
the judgment of truth. Let us search the truth and 
our judgment will not come short of the first. We 
stand before a terrible case, which, should we follow 
the dead letter of the law we could easily decide. 
But woe unto that judge who thinks that the written 
paragraphs of the criminal law exhaust human life 
and could give a satisfactory answer to every conflict 
into which man is being forced by his temperament or 
his fate. The law may give us only a few directions and 
experiences gathered from our centuries of civiliza- 
tion, it can show us the way but likewise point out 
the limitations. But the untold numbers of cases 
which lie between must be judged by our reason, our 
heart and our conscience. In that case only can we 
remove the false relation between the formalities of 
the law-giver and the demands of humanity. And, if 
we judge so, then we shall meet the true and do jus- 
tice in the highest sense. You know the heavy accu- 
sation which has this day been brought to you de- 
manding a "guilty." You know it as well as I know 
it myself, that there is not a line in our criminal code 
which gives me a right to prove to you that an error 
be possible if you follow the advice of the attorney 
for the prosecution. And yet- -permeated by a holy 
conviction to do the right — I say to you: Do not 
pronounce that terrible sentence. Put the spirit of 
humanity against the w T ritten word of the criminal 
code. Hold up the living moral of our age against 
the dead letter which has been written down by a bru- 
tal past and which an indolent present is afraid to 
eradicate. Justify the idea of a humane humanit}^, 
that under certain circumstances, the greatest mercy 
is the strictest justice — acquit the accused! 

"I assure you, gentlemen of the jury, that I speak 
with the holy conviction to attain justice. From your 
lips I read the question how I can harmonize that con- 



FATE AM> JUSTICE; <>K 

viction with the simple fact of the crime. Yes indeed — 

minder has been committed. I cannot deny it. But 
in this case as in many others in human tife it does 
not depend upon "what has been done, hut "how!" 
To understand all, is to forgive all! I will relate to 
you the story of the accused, how before the eye of 
the psycoloffist it becomes a tragedy, and I live in 
hope, that if truth can ever carry the victory over the 
forms of worldly justice in this, our fitful fever of 
life, that my conviction will become your conviction 
Likewise, and that there is something for the true 
judge which stands above the written law. Listen to 
the story of Pawel Lartschenko; follow him from the 
sunrise of his life until this terrible setting— and then 
remain cold and unmoved — if you can. 

"Have you, gentlemen of the jury, ever set your 
foot in the Bulgaren Street? I doubt it, for degra- 
dation and misery alone lead people into that part of 
the great city, where poverty wastes its wanton days 
— here deep in the earth in filthy and disease breath- 
ing basements — there under the high roofs of threat- 
ening tenements. And yet there are oases of happi- 
ness even in these refuge places of poverty! In a 
modest little cottage there lived with her three 
children, the 15-year-old Pawel, the 11-year-old 
Jelena and the 10-year-old Jrvan, Anna Filippowna 
Lartschenko. By the neighbors she was supposed to 
be a widow-woman, who had moved from Kiew r to 
Odessa, and supported herself here with her handi- 
work, giving her children a moral raising and living 
quiet lo herself. The true happiness of poverty is 
to breathe after harder days and to live in contented- 
aess regained. Anna Fillippowna received this in 
full measure, since three years ago she had overcome 
the curse of a sad marriage with a notorious drunk- 
ard. Deserted by her husband she had found a mod- 
esl bui satisfactory support through her skill as 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 83 

seamstress. Yes, in spite of her poverty, she had 
become immeasurably rich, for she was in possession 
of the respect of her neighbors and the love of her 
children, and she was happy that the terrible past had 
left no impressions upon the souls of her offsprings. 
Her pride was her oldest son, Pawel. He had been 
a dilligent boy at the parochial school, and it was cer- 
tain the high recommendation which he received three 
years ago to-day as he was being discharged hy the 
priest, would secure for him the much desired appren- 
ticeship in a merchantile house. It was an eventful 
day. With beating heart Anna Filippowna awaited 
the arrival of her son, who, in possession of a recom- 
mendation of his teacher, had wended his way to 
Michail Petrowitch Borin, the rich tea merchant, to 
ask for a position. Had the recommendation been 
well received ? Surely that Anna Fillippowna may 
not doubt ( How Pawel gone to Borin i How had 
the much respected man received him? Would he 
and could he use him in his business ? Anna Filip- 
powna listened. Did not there come hurried steps 
down the Bulgaren Street? Surely the ear of the 
mother could not cheat her. There be turned the 
corner. She leaned forward out of the window. Now 
he saw her, and full of joy waved his hand. c The 
Lord be praised!' It came from her heart to her lips, 
and then Pawel came hurrying into the room and into 
the arms of his mother. 'Mother, I have been em- 
ployed; free room and board, and at first ten rubles a 
month! I can be at home on Sunday. Hurrah!' 
And he tore himself away from his mother, threw up 
his cap against the low ceiling, and full of joy danced 
about in the room. His brother and sister hurried 
out of the sleeping room to have a part, at least, in 
the joy of their big brother. Anna Filippowna 
crossed herself while in silence she prayed to God 
that He might guide the further steps of her son. 



84 PATE AM) JUSTICE; OB 

'Joy and suffering are close together in human life, 

as in the meadow then' grow the flower and thistle 
side by side. In the midst of the joy of the family 
Lartschenko there fell suddenly a heavy shade. Before 
the one window which points towards the street there 
stood a form dressed in rags. The weak window was 
opened from the outside and a hoarse voice said: 
'Hello! you seem to have a great time. You are 
happy, perhaps, over the arrival of your father, hi?' 
And before Anna Filippowna and her children could 
recover from their fright the father, who had 
not cared for them since three years, and whom 
they supposed to be dead, stood before them. 'Well, 
why do you look at me as though I were a ghost? 
Be glad that I am home again to care for you.' So 
he addressed his wife and children as he came up 
closer. Now Pawel rose up; pale and with his 
raised fist he stepped in front of his mother. 'Don't 
touch her, father!' he cried aloud but firm. 'I will 
not permit you to hurt her.' 'Look, look, what a 
big mouth the fellow has!' spitefully said the old 
Lartschenko; then in a moderating tone he said: 
'Little fool, I have not come to punish you because 
you did not let me hear anything about you. I will 
live with you again and care for you. It is lonesome 
in the big" world. I have loafed about a great deal 
and seen some bad days until I came to Odessa to-day 
and saw the boy, and following him found you. 
Knew Pawel instantly, although he has grown large 
and strong. I will now take a rest. Give me some- 
thing to eat.' 

"Anna Filippowna, gentlemen of the jury, was a 
christian. She reconciled herself with her husband; 
he promised to give up the habit of drink and look 
for work. Pawel left the house the next morning 
and his father occupied his sleeping place. But as on 
the next morning Pawel left to take his place at Mr. 






THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 85 

Borin's, and as he bade his mother good-bye with 
kisses and tears, he whispered in her ear: 'Little 
mother, do not forget that now I am large and 
strong. If father should strike you again as at that 
time in Kiew — oh, I knew it well, even though you 
tried to eover it up and cried in silence — then come to 
me and call me. I will protect you and revenge you.' 
The son left and in his place the father moved into 
the house. With the pure soul of the child there left 
also the good spirit out of the hut on Bulgaren Street, 
and with the father there came into the house dark 
shadows which are cast before by vice. In the be- 
ginning everything went along all right. Feodor 
Stepanow had his wife to supply him with new gar- 
ments. He looked for work and found it — at the 
wharf, upon the vessels. He kept his pledge not to 
drink any more liquor, and when, on Sunday, Pawel 
visited his house, his care-worn face brightened. He 
saw then that the fears which had troubled him all 
the week, were without foundation. But it lasted a 
few months only. One Sunday, when Pawel, as 
usual, arrived home with smiling face, happy because 
his master had expressed his pleasure about him, he 
did not find his father at home. But his mother's 
face was pale and she appeared to have wept. 'What 
is the trouble, mother? ' said Powel, fearing the 
worst. 'Father — he drinks again — does he not — he 
drinks? ' She nodded her head sadly, and again care 
and fear moved into the heart of the child. What 
could the future bring ? 

"And, indeed, Feodor Stepanow drank again, and 
with the green wine misery moved into the house on 
Bulgaren Street. The great vice of the working 
classes, the desire for drink — raged against the hap- 
piness of Anna Filippowna and her children, and took 
its victims, as ever, among the innocent and the help- 
less. But it did not conquer in a few days, weeks or 



86 PATE AND ,U stick: OB 

month-: no, after years of battle of degradation, 
cruelty and vice against all moral power which God 
has planted in the hearts of the innocent. We eall it 
* Patience, ' 'to l>e resigned to fate' — ' hope in bet- 
ter times to come,' and do not know in what bloody 
letters the words have been written in the book of 
life of the poor and miserable! Deeper and deeper 
the habit of drink of the father drew 7 the furrows into 
the life of the family of Lartschenko; it cut off one 
piece of the former happiness after another and de- 
stroyed it, and crack upon crack threatened destruc- 
tion of the whole. Who among you, gentlemen of 
the jury, can measure the terrible depths in this battle 
between the good and the bad, w r hich w T ere uncovered 
without closing again and swallowed up all the earn- 
ings along with the peace and happiness. Anna Filip- 
powna and her children fought with all the persever- 
ance of their innocence. During the day, while 
Feodor Stepanow strolled from saloon to saloon, Anna 
Filippowma sewed her hot tears into the line stitches 
of her needle. Her little daughter went to work in 
the flower store, where from early morn until late 
at night, for little pay, she stood behind the counter 
and made bouquets which were sold, and Pawel, pale 
and full of care, worked with increased activity in or- 
der to forget the terrible feeling which looked for- 
ward in terror to what the next day might bring. 
Every penny, however, which mother and the child- 
ren earned, w 7 as carefully kept together to satisfy the 
ever growing claims of the father, who from day to 
day. demanded more money for whisky. True great- 
ness shows itself best in misery! 

"Can you, gentlemen of the jury, measure the tre- 
menduous moral power which lived Lartschenko's 
family, when I tell you that the mother and her child- 
ren had but one aim in life, to hide their misfortunes 
between their narrow four walls, and furthermore by 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 87 

self-sacrificing kindness to hold within limitations the 
terrible vice of their father. They succeeded but for 
a little while, and fate took its course. 

"One evening during the week, the shutters be- 
fore the show window of the tea merchant had been 
closed. In his little room on the ground floor Pawel 
Lartschenko knelt before the picture of the holy vir- 
gin and prayed. All the misery of his pure soul he 
poured out before the great benefactress, that she 
might show him how he could improve his father and 
protect his mother, brother and sister against the evil, 
the coming of which seemed inevitable! Then some 
one knocked, lightly, as though bashful, against the 
window. Frightened, Pawel arose, went to the win- 
dow and looked out into the half gloom of the sum- 
mer night. Before him stood his sister Jelena, and 
beckoned him. His limbs trembled. A terrible pre- 
monition seemed to cause his heart to stop. What had 
happened \ Trembling he made the sign of the cross, 
then he ran out into the court-yard, through the gate 
into the street, until he reached his sister, and, taking 
her hand, he asked her: 'What is the matter, Jelena? 

What has happened? Has father .' She 

beckoned and shook her head. 'Xothing, brother — 
nothing — it is nothing! I would ask you to take me 
home. Last night as I left the store,father had left 
the inn sooner than usual. Two rough looking men, 
sailors, accompanied him. They pressed themselves 
upon me, said all manner of things. I was afraid; 
father was so drunk he could not help me, and he 
thought that I was old enough and pretty — and I need 
not be reticent with his friends. If brother Ivan had not 
opened the door in time and pulled me into the house 
I do not know what would have happened. Pawel bit 
his lips. Silently he put his sister's arm into his, and 
without saying a word they walked towards Bulgaren 
Street. The next morning Pawel Lartschenko stood 



i'.\ 1 1: and JUSTICE; OB 

before his master. 'Michael Petrowitde',' he said, "I 

have to ask a favor of you. ' All right, Pawel Ferd- 
orowitch, you are a diligent and careful apprentice 
and will soon have finished your term. I shall be 
glad to do you a favor!' 'Michail Petrowitde "an- 
swered Pawel — as a gleam of thankfulness lit up his 
face -* I have to speak to my father and ask to be 
excused this forenoon. And then — may I at night, 
after closing the doors, accompany my sister Jelcna 
home? Her way leads past here— she is young and 

iiretty, and Bulgarcn Street — you know, Mlchail 
*etrowitch — c is a bad street.' * * * 'You are 
a brave boy, Pawel Ferdoro witch,' said Michael Pe- 
trowitde Borin; I gladly permit what you ask for. 1 A 
few minutes after this conversation Pawel walked with 
firm steps towards the home of his parents. On his 
way he entered an ammunition store and bought a 
cheap revolver. He hid it carefully in his coat pocket 
and then murmured: 'That is for the loafers which 
threaten my sister. In these times one cannot be care- 
ful enough, especially if one lives in Bulgarcn 
Street.' * * * 

" Shall I illustrate to you, gentlemen of the jury, 
how the conversation between father and son termi- 
nated! How the son appealed, wept and threatened 
to lead his father back upon the way of a pure life. 
I low the father repelled his son for troubling himself 
in a matter that was not his affair, — how the father 
insulted every feeling within his son, and finally, as 
Pawel, overcome by a sacred indignation demanded 
what heretofore he had only asked, the father knocked 
down, with one stroke of his hand— his own child. 
Shall 1 tell all this more fully? I believe you have 
heard enough, in order to understand that the circum- 
stances must lead to and terminate in disaster. The 
Stroke from the fist of his father which reached Pawel's 
forehead and threw him, fainting upon the floor, had 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 89 

likewise reached his heart and severed the last tender 
ties which held hiui to his father. As Pawel opened 
his eyes the}* met the worn and haggard face of Anna 
Fillippowna. Abeam of joy lit up her face. w God 
be praised, you are alive! " came like a relief from her 
lips. Passionately Pawel put his arms about his 
mother's neck. ; Mother, he struck me; I can stand 
it no longer, but it matter's not as lon^as he does not 
touch you. If he should strike you as he struck me — 
then — then I know what I am to do!' For along 
while mother and son talked and wept together, and 
however much Anna Fillippowna tried to ease the 
heart of Pawel she could not bring back to him the 
love for his father. The stroke in his face had killed 
it. The human heart is a strange thing: As it can se- 
crete a feeling of faithfulness and in spite of a world 
of care hold up hope — so wonderful it is in other re- 
spects. In one second — what has been built up through 
years and deemed holy above measure, in one second 
it may be destroyed. One moment is sufficient to turn 
a heart, softened by the holiest love — hard as stone. 
When, at night, before retiring, his head in bandage — 
Pawel knelt before the image of the Holy Virgin he 
no longer prayed of the mother of mercy how he 
could lead his father in the right way, but now he 
prayed for light and strength and the proper inspira- 
tion to do the right thing in order to protect his 
mother and sister and brother against their dread 
enemy, their own husband and father, without trans- 
gressing the holy commandments and ordinances of 
God. - Give me courage and strength, O, Holy 
Mother of God, and protect me from sin!' so it 
sounded unceasingly from his lips — in his heart. Has 
the Holy Virgin accepted his prayer? Has the all- 
wise Providence, which in a wonderful way guides all 
human action, withdrawn its hand from his innocent 
head that he may go to destruction ? Or, has Provi- 



90 'FATE AND JUSTICE; OK 

dence used him as a tool to bring just judgment upon 
tin 1 guilty \ Even though I felt to give an answer to 
this query I need not do so— Providence has done so 
already. Providence has passed its sentence and awaits 
the moment when you, Gentlemen Judges and Jury, 
will how before that judgment. 

"Did Pawel Lartschenko hate his father? I do- 
not believe it. Our people have a tendency to fatal- 
ism, and in its soul there lie hidden instincts which 
bring future prophets. So, filled by a dark premo- 
nition of an unavoidable end, it may have ruled the 
thought of Pawel and led him to believe that Provi- 
dence had chosen him to sacrifice himself that he 
might save others. In his father he saw a bad prin- 
ciple which threatened his loved ones with destruc- 
tion — and all his thought and energy were pointed in 
one direction. To protect and save his mother and 
sister, whose only protection he was. That was the 
leading thought in all his opposition towards his 
father. Early in the morning he sneaked away from 
the business and hurried to Bulgaren Street, as he 
could find no rest until he had assured-himself that his 
father had left the house. During the hour at noon 
he fled home upon the wings of care to mother, that 
he might console her — that he might advise her in a 
material way, and listen to her complaints with a 
bleeding heart. But at night he would wait before 
Michail Borin's door for the arrival of his sister, 
accompanying her home, and then wait in hiding un- 
der an opposite gate until his father, with uncertain 
step and heavy tongue parted from his drunken com- 
panions and stumbled over the doorsill into the house. 
Not until everything was quiet and Pawel, leaning his 
ear against the window-pane could hear the loud 
-noring of his drunken parent, would he leave his 
post. Be would then hurry home, sneak into his 
room and thank (rod that He had given him another 
four and twenty hours before his decision! 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 91 

"Although Pawel did not hate his father, yet he 
could not love him. And this feeling soon terminated 
in a disgust which his nature was unable to overcome 
— a disgust, which in itself is sacred; for the pure 
soul alone can experience it against brutality and 
beastliness. One eveuing as Pawel stood again hid- 
den in the doorway, waiting for the arrival of his 
father, he noticed to his surprise that his father 
walked with a somewhat firmer step than usual. 
Accompanying him was a wild-looking character 
whom Pawel had not seen before. Arriving at the 
door the two men looked about and then spoke in a 
whisper. Then the stranger put his hand into his 
blouse and brought forth a small package, opened it 
and pressed something into the hand of Feodor 
Stepanow. 'That is, by God, half of it.' Paul 
heard him sa} 7 , 'The cursed Jew would uot pay any 
more for the watch. Xext time we will do better 
business.* 'All right,' said his father, 'that will do 
for a few days. Farewell! To-morrow early at the 
wharf, near the mail steamer from Poti. I hope by 
the saints there will be some better-to-do passengers 
than there were to-day! ' And with a hoarse laugh- 
ter the two parted. 

"The night began to flee before approaching day. 
Pink and red streaks rose from the east, but still 
Pawel Lartschenko stood in the nook of the door- 
way, his forehead pressed against the cold wall, while 
with his finger nails he scratched the plastering. His 
father a thief, a criminal, upon other people's prop- 
erty—yes, perhaps, other people's lives! And the 
premonition which came to the soul of the child, as it 
went to its place of labor, has not the research in this 
case proven it tenfold \ We know it better to-day 
than the accused could have known it on that morn- 
ing: that his father, in order to .be able to satisfy his 
vice better than the earnings oi his famil} 7 would per- 



92 PATE AND .11 stice; OR 

mit, had become a member of that band of thieves 
which follow their dark profession in our port and do 
not only threaten the property, but the very life-blood 
of unsuspecting strangers. 

"The more mysterious and incomprehensible to 
humankind the patience of Heaven appears, the nearer 
it has arrived at its boundary, when in its place there 
comes punishment! Two days passed since that night 
in which Pawel Lartschenko learned to disrespect his 
father. Days on which he, like a shadow of his own 
self, moved about to do his day's work, while in his 
inner being he struggled for a firm decision. The 
morning of the third day came. It was a Sunday 
and the day of the expiation. Pawel went home 
later than usual. For the first time in his life he 
feared meeting his father. As soon as he arrived at 
Bulgaren Street and stood in front of the house, 
which, under the beams of the forenoon sun, shone in 
the beauty of poverty and cleanliness, the wmole 
misery which was held by the four walls inside rose 
before him; he leaned his head against the door and 
tears ran over his face. But he must be strong. 
Once more he would step up before his father, would 
tell him that he knew about his criminal occupation 
and would threaten him with a denouncement at police 
headquarters unless he w T ould leave the home of his 
wife and children and never return to the place in 
which he had destroyed their peace and happiness. 
Carefully he opened the door. His mother, he knew, 
was in church at early mass. He hoped to find his 
father alone and so far sobered that he could carry 
out his plan. The room was empty. His brother's 
cap did not hang upon the nail. He must have gone 
with his mother. Out from the sleeping room there 
came the hoarse voice of his father — low and per- 
suasively as though he urged some one —and in be- 
t ween — did his hearing deceive him — in between Pawel 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 93 

heard a low complaint, suppressed weeping. Stepping 
lightly, he hurried towards the door of the sleeping 
room and listened. What he heard here, while the blood 
rose to his face, gentlemen of the jury, shall I say it? 
Shall I overcome the nauseousness and disgust which 
rills me when I consider how far below the brute a 
man will sink? So deep that he does not fear to 
make an offer to his own minor child ? No, it is not 
expected of me to say what Pawel Lartschenko had 
to hear. The cry of indignation which yesterday, 
when Jelena Lartschenko bore her witness, filled this 
hall is still ringing in my ear. In my inner being 
there still trembles the indignation from yesterday, 
when the li-year-old girl related how her father had 
followed her with his offers, how she had fought him, 
how as he followed her she had, with the power of 
despair, pushed him away, and, finally, how reaching 
the door she had fallen, fainting into the arms of her 
brother. Pawel had thus caught his sister and taken 
her into the street, restored her to consciousness, after 
which, his sister leaning upon his arm, the two had 
gone towards the church to meet their mother. 

"The measure of Feodor Stephanow was running 
over, and Heaven allowed him only a few more hours 
in which to complete his worthless being. As Anna 
Filipowna, stepping out of the church, met her son and 
daughter weaping and learned the cause of their trouble, 
then her tears mingled with those of -her children, and 
the thought ripened within her to call for the protection 
of the police powers against the brute whom she 
called husband. But first she intended to accompany 
her children home, as she supposed that her husband 
had, as ever, made for the saloon. Fate, however, 
had determined differently. When mother and child- 
ren arrived at their house on Bulgaren Street, they 
found the doors locked. Anna Filippowna knocked 
and after a while Feodor Stephanow appeared in the 



94 FATE AND JUSTICE; OB 

window. When she saw her husband Anna Filip- 
powna tried to return; but her husband, apparently so- 
ber, asked her, entreated her just to wait until he had 
opened the house door. He confessed that he had 
done. wrong. He had anxiously waited for their return 
that he might ask their forgiveness. They should 
come in and they should rind a penitent one, who had 
one thought only — expiation. 'Mother, don't be- 
lieve him, I pray, don't believe him!' Pawel called 
unto her and tried to pull her away. But Anna Filip- 
powna did not listen to the warning words of her son. 
She let him deceive her. Hardly, however, had she 
and the children entered than Feodor Stephanow 
locked the door behind them and addressed his wife in 
an excited tone of voice: 'Where did you and that 
rascal intend going?' 'To the police headquarters 
was it?' 'To denounce your father and cast him into 
destruction?' 'Oh, I knew very well what you in- 
tended doing, you hypocrite, 1 will get even with 
you!' And with balled list Feodor Stephano ap- 
proached his wife. Pawel threw himself before his 
father, whose fist struck him so that he dropped to 
the side. It whirled before his eyes. Half fainting 
he saw his father catch his mother by the hair, jerk 
her to the ground an'd repeatedly strike her. The 
room seemed to turn around before his gaze. As in 
a dream lie heard the shrieks of his brother and sister, 
the threatening words of his father and the faint cries 
for help of his mother. He saw plainly how his father 
raised his foot to hit his mother in the face with his 
sole, set with iron nails. Then with his right hand he 
reached for his coat pocket; in his hand there appeared 
a revolver; a shot rang through the house and, with- 
out a sound, as though struck by lightning Feodor 
Stephanow, with a shot through his head fell on his 
fainted wife. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 95 

"I am at an end, gentlemen of the jury. That, 
half an hour after the deed, Pawel Lartschenko 
appeared at the police station and accused himself of 
parricide is familiar to you. He was quiet and resigned, 
for the kiss which at his departure his mother had 
pressed upon his brow had given him the sanctifica- 
tion of innocence upon that hard road. * * * And I call 
it out into the world that he is innocent, although his 
father had fallen at his hand. Not the deed must 
speak here; no, and again no'! The circumstances 
under which the deed was committed speak louder 
than the act. The fate which hung over the family 
Lartschenko was fulfilled. We stand before the ter- 
rible end, but in vain I listen for the voice which cried 
to Heaven for a terrible crime. No crime was com- 
mitted, but an act of justice has been dealt out 
through the hand of the accused. Providence had 
selected him as a judge to bring punishment to an 
outlaw, who, according to human ideas, had earned 
the gallows a thousand times. It is written that not 
a hair shall be bent without the will of God. Is there 
any doubt still ? The will of God hath been done. 
And where the Lord has judged man, -ought to be 
silent! Instead, however, to pass a judgment over 
the crimes of the father, you, gentlemen of the jury, 
sit here— irony of fate — in judgment over the son, 
whose hand, led by a higher power, had carried out 
the punishment which, according to law and justice, 
you yourself would have meted out to Feodor 
Stephanow Lartschenko! Where is the crime there 
which demands conviction? Weakness alone can see 
a dead crime in the deed. Wisdom searches after the 
true cause of the deed and does not judge where 
there is no evil thought or intention, no passion which 
has blended the innocence of the heart and sense. * * * 
Gentlemen of the jury, you know the whole truth. 
•Go now and do justice. And if you can find but one 



90 i a if. and JU8TICE; OB 

dark spot in the thought and action of Pawel Lart- 
schenko then indeed pronounce over his head the 
word guilty! " 

The attorney stopped, and silent, as they had 
been, the mass of people remained in the court halls. 
Only for a moment, however, and a long breath of 
awakening was perceptible; it commenced to pass 
over in slight noise until it terminated in an excite- 
ment of applause which made the building tremble. 

The attorney for the state did not desire to say 
another word, while the jurymen, earnestly and 
silently, followed their leader into the juryroom, and 
silence again rested over the mass of people; the 
minutes grew to hours and to an eternity of terrible 
expectation. Then the door opened and the jurymen 
reappeared. They took their seats, and the leader 
arose and addressed the court: "Your Honor," he 
said, with a voice trembling with joyous sympathy, 
"after careful investigation and under the conviction 
that what is right before God must be justice before 
man, the jury have considered the question, 'Is the 
accused, Pawel Lartschenko, guilty of parricide/ and 
come to the unanimous decision: No, he is not guilty! 
The Lord have mercy upon this judgment!" A cry 
of joy was the answer to the words. In the excite- 
ment of the common joy, however, and the unceasing 
applause which set vibrating the halls of justice, there 
died a low call with which a dark dressed figure fell 
upon the neck of Pawel Lartschenko. The call, 
suppressed by the tears of joy: "My son, my son!" 

Whether or not the attorney for the defense him- 
self believed every word which he laid upon the 
hearts of the jurymen, in regard to the avenging arm 
of Providence, which raised the arm of innocence, 
the arm of the boy to mete out punishment for the 
crime of the father, it would be hard for me to tell. 
But if he did, then I salute him as the first one whom 
I know who stands with me in the same light. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 97 

Hud he made that speech, however, without be- 
lieving in its moral contents that I should say that he 
himself, even as Fawel Lartschenko, has been the means 
in the hands of God to bring his purposes to the just 
ends, insofar as he put the truth into the hearts of the 
jurymen. Appealing to their moral feeling he would 
see the willful criminal punished and him only. In 
that case, however, the speech would have been no 
studied one, but rather, as we would say, extempore, 
from the heart, from conviction, the result either of 
sympathy or of impression. 

It seems impossible to me that the attorney for 
the defense should find these eloquent sentences with- 
eut light from above — without true inspiration, not 
only of conviction, but from higher powers trans- 
ferred upon him, at the very moment of the defense, 
as they are simply unchangeable truth. * 

The ways of God are not our w~ays, and where 
justice demands it, every human being becomes his 
means for an end, either to improve or to maintain an- 
other. The existence of the body plays but a small 
role when it depends to help the soul. For the soul 
is the real personality, the real "I," while the body 
is the means to make easy the progress of the soui. 
Still justice needs at all times just means to gain her 
ends. 

62. Let us consider another short story here to 
complete what has been related. 

A poor woman in Kalos, Hungary, so reports 
the "Pesther Lloyd," had four sick children; the old- 
est, a girl, is idiotic, the other three very badly 
crippled. On the 3rd of this month two of the chil- 
dren died suddenly, which surprised no one. On the 
day after the funeral, the peasant woman coming home 
from the field found her idiotic daughter lying in the 
yard -in a state of fever, but her son was not to be 
found. Frightened, she asked for the boy and the 



98 l All. AND JUSTICE; OB 

girl announced: " He is in the house and will die like 
the others." Terrified, she ran into the house and 
found her child, strangled and with a blue face, in the 
bed. Upon his neck there 4 were still the marks of 
strangulation. The daughter at once admitted her 
terrible deed. "My father who died appeared to me 
and told me that I should send him his children. I 
have sent him two already, and now the third one." 
The poor mother sank fainting to the ground. The 
court has ordered an investigation and the bodies are 
to he exhumed. 

The average man sees "nothing" in this tragedy, 
but that an idiotic girl, because she was idiotic killed 
her three sisters, and gives for a cause perhaps, neg- 
lect of parent. And the court must acquit the girl 
because she is an idiot. A thinking man, however, 
says Why? if everythingin the world happens accord- 
ing to justice, should these innocent children die of 
strangulation? Why through the hand of their own 
sister an idiot? Why was she idiotic? Why this 
strange — but not idiotic answer— to her mother — an 
answer in which itself carries thick books, a world full 
of unexplored in its meaning. If idiotic, wdience then 
had she these words? And who can either prove or 
disprove the truth of her assertion? We can well say: 
'•It is all foolishness," but we have not cleared up 
anything by scoffing them. The true reasoner will 
nOl be idle, but will search for the true cause, and 
" whosoever seeketh he shall find." 

It would be in every way against the justice of 
God that those spiritually and intellectually healthy 
children should, "without apparent cause," through 
mere chance, be strangled to death by an idiotic girl, 
since "not a hair shall fall from our heads without the 
will of our Father which is in Heaven." If God had 
created all men equal, and only for one existence, why 
did not these three children have as much right to live 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 99 

as other people, until they had become old, and had 
seen life and learned and experienced \ What shall 
become of these undeveloped souls which in this exis- 
tence had Qneither time nor opportunity to learn 
and to become wise. Has God created them and 
put them into the school of life to withdraw them 
from school before they have even commenced their 
first lesson ? Before they have had an opportunity to 
get unto an equal footing with their fellow beings, or 
were they like others, not in need of a school? They 
were sent over through a terrible death — strangula- 
tion. If they had lived before and had been created 
innocently, why should an all-good God let them be 
destroyed at the hands of a murderess and thus with- 
hold from them the knowledge of life. What could 
have been the -purpose of their short and pitiful exis- 
tence? Why was the daughter born an idiot if she 
had not existed before? — who had been been created a 
spirit, for Heaven, which too idiotic for earth was still 
good enough, (idiotic, and without education) good 
enough for Heaven. 

Can idiocy exist in Heaven ? Where would Heaven 
be \ Where would be the beauty and purpose of cre- 
ation, if idiocy and ignorance represent Heaven? 
Do not all the great and the intelligent come -from 
Heaven, from the invisible power? Where there were 
none but innocent children spirits and innocent idiotic 
spirits to people a world (and surely, idiots must be in- 
d /cent, or else they would be subject to human laws of 
justice) there can, according to my views, be no 
Heaven. 

Heaven is and can only be an embodiment of 
highest intelligence, highest wisdom, understanding, 
love, brotherhood, blessed contentment, purity and 
perfection. 

Neither a newly created innocent child nor an 
idiot (likewise innocent), nor insane (likewise innocent), 



100 PATE AND JUSTICE; OH 

nor a fool, nor an ignoramus, nor a spoiled child, nor 
8 BaVage can enter Heaven or taste of it. 

Wisdom, highest wisdom in all things, and purity, 
are the attributes which constitute Heaven. Who is 
able to give a satisfactory answer to all these ques- 
tions, which is at -once in accord with the justice of 
God. 

63- Either God has created the soul commencing 
at the lowest animal under which condition the souls, 
equally ignorant, strove, labored and evolved through 
the various stages into higher and higher develop- 
ment, so that every existence or every attainment 
became a property of the soul, or God has created 
the human child as it is to-day, and thus has given to 
the child a condition of being without its own merit. 
An idiotic child according to His notion; a cripple 
born without legs, according to His will; the silly 
child because He desired him that way; an ugly one 
because it pleased Him to do so; a blind one because 
He did not want him to admire the beauty of nature; 
a noble man because he would show preference to 
him. The rich He must have created thus because He 
willed him to have wealth; the poor man because it 
was a pleasure to Him to see men suffer. He created 
a irenius because He wished to give him an advantage 
over others, and a bad man or a savage because He 
desired to create the bad. In this last case, however, 
every thinking man would admit that God would have 
been very unjust, and, even should one object by the 
a-<ertion~ that God has made laws for all things, 
which, indeed, I do not deny, that all these conditions 
have been brought about by laws, without our inter- 
ference, then I say, they would be very unjust laws, 
and God would be a willful, barbaric, unjust God, 
while we would not be responsible for any of our 
actions. We cannot have been created into our ex- 
istence of to-day merely; it must have happened 
before, for God must he just. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 101 

61. But that we are responsible, even for the 
smallest of our actions, is proven by oar every-day 
bodily life. Whosoever eats too much is punished 
by the law. Whosoever drinks too much is punished 
likewise. So do the laws of nature lead us in all our 
actions, be they mental or material. Everyone will 
be and feel or progress, will suffer and pay, receive 
or enjoy according to his own actions or according to 
his own adjustment to universal laws. He who goes 
upon the natural and right road will live and be 
happy under any laws, while he who acts against the 
laws of nature must suffer. 

65. Would not the idiot, the cripple, the blind, 
the lame, the ignorant, the ugly., the suffering, the 
poor, rise up against God in discontent and ask: 
"Father, why hast thou created me below others? 
Why doest thou let me suffer, although I love you? 
Why has my neighbor not only wealth, but healthy 
limbs besides, while I am so poor that I do not know 
where to lay my head, and am ugl} 7 and deformed 
besides? Great Father, am not I thy child as well? 
Doest thou act justly towards me? Why? 

So and similarly every unfortunate one will ask. 
It is so very natural. Everyone will admit that. It 
appears a mass of injustice rather than love of a 
creator. 

If such an unfortunate poor man could under- 
stand the answer which God gave him, he would hear 
about the following: "You are all my children. Hove 
you all alike. All of you have had the same begin- 
ning. Whatever you are to-day, you have attained it 
yourself on your long journey to your present state, 
therefore carry your own cross with patience, and 
strive to acquaint yourself with my just laws, and fur- 
thermore to respect them, and you will be happy." 

About like that, set in human speach, our Heav- 
enly Father would answer us; that he has given unto 



102 fa n: and JUSTICE; OB 

none an advantage over another, nor burdened any 
one, wilfully, with deformity or disease. But that 
all our suffering and our pain are the results of our 
own transgressions of his laws. Our heavenly Father, 
who loves all of his children in the equal and infinite 
love, he could not, in his justice, make his choice at 
the birth of man and thus create one to become the 
slave of another. It would not be in harmony with 
His love and justice and be in discord with His all 
wisdom. 

66. God is and remains absolute^' just, and upon 
this fact alone must we build all our theories and 
conclusions. If our conclusions contradict absolute 
justice, or if they cannot be brought into accord with 
the same, then they cannot stand — they are lies and 
must be dropped. 

If God has created all men equal, and given to 
none an advantage over another, according to his ab- 
solute justice and equal love for all his children, and 
if we see that such differences are actually existing, 
then it becomes self-evident that we have lived before 
and perhaps have fought our way through innumer- 
able existences, and, in order to be happy, have to 
light our way through more, either upon this, our 
earth, or upon other planets. 

Not merely on account of progression do the suc- 
cessive existence happen, but many of them occur on 
account of errors committed towards his fellow-be- 
ings. 

67. We could shorten, or at least lessen, many 
of our existences, if we did not commit injustices 
towards one another, for which we must expiate every 
time and on account of whieh we put upon ourselves 
new trials, yes, at times very hard trials, which de- 
mand whole existences for expiation, and, like a fire 
baptism, purify the soul. For all evil is impurity, 
and crime is wilful evil, which consequently must 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 103 

be atoned for, and for which it may take more than 
one existence. 

Atonement is not sufficient, however, to perfect 
the human spirit, it merely makes men pure (/. <?., 
from error), but not always good, consequent!}-, the 
evil part of human nature must be rooted out, which 
happens frequently by means of terrible experiences, 
either individual or social. May it cost what it will 
— be it miseiy, disgrace or heart pangs — it is God's 
plan to lead every soul, each of his children, towards 
perfection. 

68. And why should the comprehending spirit 
mind a few existences more or less, or even a few 
bodily sufferings, if it feels that like a pure crystal 
it will come forth from the impure surroundings, and 
then as a higher being be enabled to take active part 
in the great harmony of things, and thus likewise 
to understand the works of the Creator in a purer 
light. 

69. How can he mind a few existences, if he 
understands that as he advances in knowledge more 
and more of the works of God become manifest unto 
him? To many men a re-incarnation seems uncalled 
for, but as spirits they will think differently. If 
progress and puritication become necessary in order 
to gain the desired end, and where this cannot be 
brought about except by a bodily existence, the spirit 
will soon learn to ask for re-incarnation. Will not the 
w r anderer, who has arrived at a goal or at a raging 
river, do almost anything in order to reach his golden 
end of paradise which he can see on the other side? 
He would overcome many fears of danger in order to 
get across, and under any conditions try to get to his 
destination, especially if he can see before him the 
certainty to be happy. 

As it is impossible to atone for crimes committed 
by material bodies in any way, except through mat- 



I'll l'A II. AM) justice; OB 

ter, re-incarnation into matter is the only means to 
accomplish the same. Re incarnation into matter is 
the only means by which the human spirit, passing 
through all the phases of being, can progress. 

To. I believe that if re-incarnation was but a 
human theory and nothing more, then our Lord Jesus 
Christ would not have taught it to His apostles. We 
do not know how often and how plainly he has taught 
ii. as none of His apostles mention it definitely, yet 
that He did teach re-incarnation is proven by the fact 
that they had a knowledge of re-incarnation when 
they asked him who was John the Baptist. And the 
Lord seys (Matt., xi, 14-15): "And if ye will receive 
it, this is Elias which was for to come." (Malachi, 
iv, 4.) "He that has ears to hear let him hear." We 
would say: "He who has sense, let him reason." 
And in Matt., xvii, 10-13, His disciples asked Jesus: 
' 'Why then, say the scribes, that Elias shall first 
come?" And Jesus answered and said unto them: 
"Eiias truly shall first come and restore all things. 
But 1 say unto you that Elias is come already, and 
they knew him not, but have done unto him whatso- 
ever they liked. * ' * * Then the disciples under- 
stood that He spoke of John the Baptist." 

Because re-incarnation, or, in other words, re- 
birth, is the only means offered for our atonement to 
reconcile one man to another and to restore a common 
harmony, then it, indeed, is nothing more or less than 
our salvation from our burden and disgrace and the 
means of progression of all, as w T e progress in so far 
as we learn and experience. 

71. The idiotic daughter of our story was an 
advanced spirit. Her existence, while it was a trial, 
it jvas likewise a mission. Yes, she was a free-willed 
victim for the salvation of others. She and her father 
have been the victims in a former existence of the 
v tv ones whom she now strangled. Out of love and 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 105 

duty she sacrificed herself and became a sister to her 
enemies, and. led by the hand of justice, the higher 
power acted through her hand and brought about a 
just expiation. Idiocy was the end of providence. 
Yet when she told the circumstances to her mother, 
which every one supposed to be the result merely of 
idiocy, she told the highest truth. 

"Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou 
hast perfected praise." — Matt., xxi, 16. 

72. If we consider our every-day life, how full 
of deep truth it is. How man} 7 events there are 
which, although we attach no meaning to them, yet 
they would, if tasted, give light on many a hidden 
subject, over the existence of which even in our nine- 
teenth century, the world is still in the dark. If the 
human spirit did not have a tendency to leave aside 
the nearest and commonest facts while it strives to 
unravel, the things which are destined for the highest 
spirits alone, our progress would be a great deal 
faster. The first to be understood is our own self 
and the laws of justice, and all the rest will come to 
us of itself. (Matt., vi, 33.) A universal knowledge, 
an eternal and universal peace will then lay the first 
foundation >tone. The understandings of the univer- 
sal law of justice which stands before God is ''the 

STONE OF THE WISE." 

And it. the stone of the wise, we find in and 
through ourselves if we will but seek and try and 
observe. There is so much going on within and 
around us. every day. that to the plainest observer 
there opens itself a new and ever greater world in 
wonderfully short time. The routine of human events, 
the strange social and spiritual positions of men — the 
wavering fortunes and failures, hatred and love, all 
these have a lesson for us. Even words and ideas 
which pass, unconsciously, through the mind of the 
must common observer, are enough to teach him the 
way to the real truth of life. 



L06 i'a if. and JUSTICE; OB 

The way to heaven and divine world harmony is 
open only through the understanding and compre- 
hension of the laws of justice and love. Therefore, 
Bays Christ: "lam the way and the truth and the 
life. No one conies (to the glory of the divine har- 
mony) — 'the father, 5 but through me." It is Christ 
himself who brought the knowledge to us in word 
and deeds. I merely regret that such a small por- 
tion of his teachings has been transmitted to us by his 
apostles, but John himself says that all the books in 
the world could not hold all that the Lord had taught, 
neither could the world understand it all. 

Probably he only revealed his great truths to his 
pupils — (John, xxi, 25), alone, as he must have felt 
that the time had not yet arrived that all the world 
should understand him. Even language itself had to 
develop that it became no longer necessary to talk in 
parables. It was necessary for certain branches of 
culture and science, that they should struggle through 
various re-incarnations, so that by the gathering 
together of certain experiences the spirits would gain 
a certain purity and completeness before they could 
receive the great truths both of revelation and of 
science. 

Sooner or later, every truth, according to the 
completeness of the civilization, will come forth from 
the darkness and be received and understood. The 
idea of absolute justice of God, as the gradual pay- 
ment of our debts of sin through re-incarnation the 
improvement of our souls through successive exist- 
ences, common harmonic brotherly love towards one's 
enemy for his and everybody's development, they 
are all teachings of our high and noble redeemer, 
Jesus Christ. 

Although his apostles have left but little record 
of his life, yet that little is sufficient to give to the 
unprejudiced searcher the full truth. Let us always 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 10? 

read all things and try them, ivithout being preju- 
diced, and we shall find the right wa}^ more free and 
clear, that each individual, and, indeed, the whole 
world can gain the end of peace and union through 
absolute "justice alone. 



F^RT III. 

(BROTHER and love.) 

73. Without the idea that our own efforts, our 
own works, our own free will are the cause of all our 
fate with its accompanying suffering or joy, we should 
not be able to come to any just conclusion. 

It is our own reward or our own sorrow wdien we 
enjoy or suffer on the various roads through life and 
meet with those many and varied experiences, at the 
end of each of w T hich we would send forth a prayer of 
thanks, though such prayer consist of two words 
merely, as: "Thank God," "Praise God," "At 
last," etc. Whatever apparent accident we meet with 
we must trace it to our own fault as the real cause. 
Accidents can be nothing but the result of former states 
of existence, and cannot be explained in any other 
way, than through a life which has been lived through 
several lives, under one law of common justice — Love. 

He w T ho is being loved hy his heavenly friends, is 
protected and safe and it would be difficult for any 
accident to happen to him. But that, too, must come 
to an end as soon as the time arrives for his purifica- 
tion and improvement. 

Our spirit guide or brother, who loves us, leads 
us through thorns and suffering— until we have be- 
come pure and good. This Love is the work of Christ. 
The good spirit guide, out of pure love, will accom- 
pany his charge through suffering and pain, through 



108 I'M I. AM) justice; OH 

disappointment and expiations, through joys and 
death, and carry with him and suffer with him all 
things, in order to make him good and free, and then 
lead him unto the spheres of Christian humanity. This 
Christian Love is the most inconceivable, noblest and 
highest consolation for the soul burdened with a heavy 
load of sin, and which could otherwise find no way to 
become pure and free. 

The soul knows that the law is there to make it 
wise and intelligent in so far as it heaps experience 
upon experience, but it also sees that the law does not 
take the crime and evil from the shoulders of men, but 
rather that such a burden becomes heavier and harder 
from one existence to another, and that a reconciliation 
depends upon the brotherly love created by Jesus 
Christ. 

And we are all friends and foes, mixed up Iry re- 
incarnation, into father and mother, brother and sis- 
ter. The high spirit, who denies himself all glory, and 
sacrifices himself that he may be our guide for our 
well-being and development, him we truly name our 
"brother," in the truest sense of the term. This 
"brother 1 ' it is who leads the manifold and strange 
occurrences and chapters of our lives. 

He it is who calculated and brought about so- 
called "chance." He it is who at times lets us say 
those unguarded words or brings those ingenious 
thoughts to our minds at the proper moment. There 
are poets and writers who are astonished at themselves 
about the fluency of heavenly thoughts that flow from 
their pen. These come from such a brother. 

To a highly moral man there is given by the 
Ruler of all a spirit guide which does not have any 
further need of re-incarnation. Jt is a spirit of divine 
wisdom. His intelligence is far above that of human 
kind. He is a holy spirit. Therefore the Lord says 
'John xiv, 15 -IS): "If ye love me keep my command- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 109 

merits, and I will pray the Father, and He shall give 
you another comforter (a guide) that he may abide 
with you forever; even the spirit of truth whom the 
world cannot receive because it seeketh him not, neith- 
er knoweth him; but ye know him for he dwelleth 
with you and shall be in you," etc. (Verse 26) But 
the comforter, which is the holy ghost (or spirit) whom 
the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you 
all things and bring all things to your remembrance, 
whatsoever I have said unto you. 

In John vii, 37-39 the Lord says: "If a man 
thirst let him come unto me and drink." He that be- 
lieveth on me, as the scriptures hath said, out of his 
body shall flow rivers of living water. But this he 
spake of the spirit which they that believed on him 
should receive — for the holy spirit (the brother or 
guide) was not yet given; because that Jesus was not 
yet glorified. 

Those who understand the high and moral teach- 
ings of Christ will positively receive a holy guide and 
will long with prayer and from an earnest desire for a 
pure life. 

The modern church believes in the letter of the 
scripture, and will have received the holy spirit— to 
make the church appear as genuine, but it is all show 
and not fact. The church understands by the letter, a 
common, large part of God which fills the universe, 
or perhaps the spirit of God himself which poured 
itself upon every member of the church, as for in- 
stance a piece of flame that can be taken apart, and 
yet, should we ask the individual members of any 
church, they would deny any knowledge of the same 
and would consider an intercourse with God an im- 
possibility. Christ definitely promises a "comforter" 
for actual companion, and he who denies that has in- 
deed the letter in his heart but not the "brother." 

The Lord calls it "the spirit of truths," a com- 



110 FATE AND JUSTICE; OR 

forter in despair and need, which shall teach us all 
things and shall remind us of the truths and of all 
which he has taught. These words of the Lord in 
elude a positive, direct and plain intercourse between 
man and the spirit guide which he gives us. If he 
has to teach me then indeed I must know him 
and understand his teachings and be able to ask 
him concerning that which is not plain to me. 
If he is to comfort me, then I must receive his 
comfort and understand it. The communication must 
not merely exist in the imagination. If the words of 
the Lord are true, then there is not merely a feeling, 
like imagination that the holy spirit dwells in man, 
but it must be real fact — there must be a real, hu- 
man, direct and plain understanding between myself 
and the spirits. 

AY here would be the wisdom of God in sending 
a Messiah or a Redeemer to men, who should give his 
life for a cause and afterwards, instead of leading us 
on by the truth, we should be lead by our faulty 
imagination? The wisdom of God must have fore- 
ordained all things. 

Christ gives to us the present of a comforter (the 
holy brother) as a seal to prove the truth of his teach- 
ing and his mission. 

Every one must see that if the teaching of Christ 
were dimne indeed, and sent by God for the elevation 
of humankind, then the same must be a plain, natural 
fact easily understood. Is not the wisdom of God 
greater than that of man? Did not He know before- 
hand that, without plain proof, it would not stand? 
All religions which have not the fact of communica- 
tion with a highest, intelligent, transcendental brother 
arc human work. God puts the crown upon belief 
and then belief becomes knowledge. Knowledge is 
fullesl truth. 

What beautiful words does the Lord speak to 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. Ill 

His disciples: "I will not leave you comfortless. I 
will come to you, and I will send you a comforter (*. 
e. a holy spirit) to abide with you.'' That comforter, 
He declares, is the spirit of truth, and this spirit of 
truth, this comforter, is the one given to the true 
Christian for a spirit guide and protector, of which I 
spoke already: it is the high saint which sacrifices 
himself for his brother from a motive of pure love. 
Into his hands have been laid our fate, our destiny 
and our progression. Inexhaustible means are at his 
command that he may make himself understood 
to his charge and likewise to lead him. I am ac- 
quainted with a man who knows his hoi} 7 brother, and 
whenever he asks him mentally he receives a reply in 
human speech, plain and distinct. Spirit guide and 
charge are thus in continual communication with each 
other. This spirit sees and hears every smallest 
thought of his charge. He is the true teacher of 
every pupil. 

"The world,'' says Christ, "cannot receive the 
spirit of truth, but those only who believe on Him 
and do as He commanded; i. e. he who is willing from 
the depth of his heart to lead a just and true life, 
according to the morals of Christ." 

Why does the modern Christian church den}' a 
direct communication with the holy spirits that can 
be understood by everybody? I leave this question 
to be answered by the reader. It is too simple to be 
answered by me. Whoever has received such a holy 
guide must surely know it. and to doubt such a fact 
would simply be impossible. Rattier would he suffer 
martyrdom than deny it. 

As a matter of fact, however, the existence of 
this holy guide cannot be illustrated, as it is not pub- 
lic or a common natural law, but rather something 
coming to the individual which the individual must 
best know himself. It is not natural law any farther 



112 i'A ri". and JD8TICB; OB 

than that it is necessitated by the moral law of love: 
"One for all and all for one." 

We must not forget that God is not only the em- 
bodiment of justice, hut likewise that of love, which, 
through the highest spirit, "Jesus Christ," He has 
scut into the world that we may rise in justice through 
Him and His example, and receive Him as our great- 
est guide and leader to lift us out of our humble 
estate. 

"I draw all men unto me." — John xvii, 32. 
All — whosoever will come and uses the exertion in his 
power to leave the evil and do the good, and who is 
determined to improve himself through labor and 
effort: " The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, 
and the violent take it by force." Matt. xi:12. 

No one needs to think, however, that, although 
such a leader or guide has been given to him on his 
way through life, his own efforts cease, and that from 
his high brother everything is presented to him. No, 
No ! Progress is made possible only in a fair way. 
He who has a guide merely gains his ends a little 
sooner — just like a pupil who passes through school 
under a wise and strict teacher has an advantage over 
him who has to struggle through the lessons without 
such assistance and guidance. 

74. He who has a guide does no longer stand 
under the law, but as the scriptures say: "Under 
grace," more appropriately called "Love." For out 
of love, God gives help and assistance in the person 
of the "brother," who undertakes his heavy task out 
of pure love. So there can be no " grace," as that 
would be an "acceptance of person" with God, and 
we have seen that everything must be merited— must 
be earned. God is absolutely just towards all His chil- 
dren. " Grace " comes from exaltation alone, which 
- not or will not know the right way. Therefore 
God cannot be gracious as He is pure lived and abso- 
lutely just. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 113 

111 order to show what a spirit guide can do that 
he may bring his charge upon the right way. I will 
relate a short Italian story, which may perhaps be 
classed in the line of legend — but how much truth 
there lies hidden in a legend may remain a secret to 
most, as it is necessary, in order to comprehend it, to 
be familiar with the ways of justice. To Him, who 
understands, and who has a guide Himself, there are 
many things plain and providential. It is easy for Him 
to separate the truth from human imagination. We 
have no right to discard as absurd eveiythino- which 
we do not understand. The fool alone can afford to 
do that, but the wise man tries and studies without 
prejudice until he arrives at a definite result. My 
story which is entitled "The Angel," is written by E. 
O. Hopp. 

75. Once upon a time there dwelled in Sicily a pow- 
erful kino-, who was a brother to the Emperor of Ger- 
many and to the Pope, and who was proud, haughty 
and very tyrannical towards his subjects, while he lived 
in great state. His hand rested heavy upon the land 
so that not even the old nobility, now the priesthood, 
were exempt from his oppression. At the least error 
many a man had to wander to prison, and whoever 
dared to murmur was punished on body and life. 
Many feared him, few loved him. One day the king, 
surrounded by the great of his kingdom, his escorts 
and his staff, sat in church. Dinner time was passed; 
it was depressingly hot and sultry, and the king's eyes 
closed. The last words which he heard from the lips 
of the priest were, "That God hath elevated the 
humble and brought low the great," and in his heart 
he felt angry about those words. t; Who can humble 
me. the brother to the emperor and of the pope, who 
both have the highest power on earth?" So he thought 
in his mind, and furthermore: "My throne is s:olid. 
God Himself could not dethrone me. But that dar- 



1 1 I r.\ n: and JUSTICE; OB 

i n <r priest who has preached such revolutionary words, 
I wi ii .» 

Filled with thoughts of anger and wrath, he fell 
asleep. As he awoke it seemed to have become night; 
the church was dark and still and there was nobody 
present. He looked about in surprise. He was alone. 
Nobody seemed to have cared for him. The discov- 
ery did not seem to allay his wrath: angry he had fallen 
asleep and in the same state of mind he awoke. He 
hastened to the portals of the church; they were 
closed; he was imprisoned. Now he started a great 
noise, hit with his list against the doors and gave vent 
to terrible expressions. 

The noise had lasted for some time when at last 
the people upon the street heard it Terror- 
stricken, everyone hurried to the sexton and said that 
that the devil was present in the church and that his 
cry was audible afar off. The sexton shook his head, 
took the heavy bunch of keys, called some of the 
neighbors together, who took with them their arms 
and thus they went to the place. 

"It is not apt to be the devil," the sexton re- 
marked assuringly, "but perhape a thief or a tramp 
who was locked into the church while he attempted to 
steal. We will get even with him." Fearlessly he 
opened the door, and behold, a man with a wild beard 
jumped up who threatened the sexton and told him 
that he would have him punished for this insult to his 
majesty. 

••\\ no, then, are you man?" the sexton said re- 
spectfully, "that you use such high words," while he 
looked sarcastically and smiling at the poor garments 
of the angry one. 

"I," shouted the king as he arose. "I am the 
king and 1 will have you feel for your deed!" 

lie gave vent to loud cursing, but the sexton com- 
manded him to be silent. "You the king!" he laughed. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 115 

"Friends; have you ever seen a king in such an ap- 
pearance, in such seedy garments?" Everybody 
laughed, and shaking their heads, they left. "He is 
a fool,'' one of the citizens said; "he has run off from 
the asylum,'' said another. "He ought to be held 
under the pump," said a third one. Soon the king 
stood there alone. 

The haughty monarch was so angry he hardly 
knew what he was doing. What had happened to 
him? Where were his kingly garments? How had 
his servants dared to leave him alone at church? No 
matter! His revenge should meet them all, who had 
acted in such a way towards the holiness of their ruler 
and king. With hurried steps he went towards his 
palace; it rained, and the streets were dirty and dark; 
so wet and covered with dirt he arrived at the portals. 
The sentinels looked at him in surprise. They tried 
to prevent his entering. Angrily he pushed them 
aside and hurried up the marble steps. In the large 
banquet hall there flamed the torches; there sat his 
true ones, the counts and barons, and at their head 
upon the seat of the throne, there sat 

He was startled, clad in kingly garments, noble 
and with bright eyes and in a halo of beauty there sat 
He. Himself, but more majestic in form, with nobler 
expression and divine grace. 

All turned around and looked with surprise at 
the intruder. "Hurry him away, the deceiver!" 
cried out the king with a hoarse voice, and pointed 
towards the angel, which had taken his place. He 
wanted to grasp his sword, but it had disappeared, 
and in its place there was a leather strap with a stick. 

A roar of laughter filled the hall. 

"Cast him down stairs," the Court Marshal 
called and beckoned to the servants, " How has this 
man come in here ? " 

"Oh, no," the angel said kindly, "don't you see 



11G fa n; and JU8TICE; OB 

that be is a fool! " Let him remain at court in future 
and entertain as as such. Put him into the stables, 
give him a fool's garment and a little room by 
himself. 

So it was done. The next morning when the 
king awoke, he found himself with the horses who 
nickered as they saw him. At the feet of his straw 
bed there sat a monkey, his future play- companion, 
who looked at him, showing its teeth. Upon a chair 
there laid a fool's garment, made of many colors, 
bordered with fox skin and covered with little bells. 
There was no help. He had to obey and dress in the 
fool's garment. At every step the bells would tingle. 
The pages laughed and joked, as soon as they saw 
him, while the girls punched him and pinched him 
and had their fun with the fool. In darkest anger 
and terrible wrath the king took every insult. 

At times the angel appeared, the fiery glance of 
whose eyes seemed to enter into the innermost depth 
of his soul. "Who am I and who are you?" he 
asked. And always the answer came: " You are a 
fraud and I am king! " However disgraceful they 
treated him, his haughtiness they could not break, 
and the obstinnacy of his heart remained the same. 

Years passed. The golden age seemed to have' 
come for the island, which overflowed with oil and 
wine. Blessings spread everywhere under the gentle 
hand of the angel ; passions were silenced and peace 
had taken possession of every home. The king fool 
alone -pent his days in powerless obstinacy and a 
heart filled with hatred. 

There it happened that at Eastertime the em- 
peror and the pope had arranged for a meeting at 
Rome. T'heir brother, the King of Sicily, was like- 
wise invited. Immediately the angel got ready. In 
a ureal state he moved through the Italian cities. His 
stall wore silver helmets and silk cloaks, while they 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 117 

rode tine horses decorated with fancy ribbons, 
austrich plumes and little flags, and under glorious 
music they passed through the streets. At the end 
of the procession there rode the fool, whom they 
had given a bony old horse which trotted along slowly 
and under difficulties. His checkered garments and 
the helpless animal caused great fun to the street gam- 
ins. Behind him, on his rolled up cloak, there sat the 
monkey, and even the wrathful face of the fool 
seemed a mask merely, put on for the purpose of 
creating merriment. Hardly, however, had he arrived 
at Rome and seen his brothers than he broke through 
the line of the masses and hastened towards them. 
He implored them to save him. That he w r as their 
brother; a fraud had taken up bis place and forced 
him from the throne. The emperor and pope looked 
at each other in surprise, yet they believed the word 
of the angel rather than his. Upon a sign the guards 
led the fool away. So this last attempt had failed. 

Easter in the meantime had been celebrated un- 
der great and holy exertion; and the presence of the 
angel, his beneficient and sacred influence filled all 
hearts with holy inspiration and a deep feeling of 
heavenly peace. The rich in their mansions and the 
poor in their huts alike felt the nearness of the mes- 
senger of God; finally, in the heart of the kingly 
fool there came the desire for good — the adjustment 
to the will of God. His haughty will had been broken 
and he sought for grace w ? ith a believing heart. One 
evening after they had returned to their home in 
Sicily the angel sat alone in the halls of the throne; 
near the door there crouched the fool. Through an 
open window there came a light breeze of evening, 
filled with fragrance from the gardens, and silence all 
around. From the distant monastery there came, 
pure and clear, the vesper sounds. Like a salute 
from the better home of men the chords of the sacred 
song tilled the heart of the kingl}- fool. 



1 is i a n: and JUSTICE; ok 

The angel beckoned to him to approach, while a 
halo transfigured his face, which seemed likewise to 
brighten the hall. 

"Who am I, and who are you?" the question was 
asked as formerly. And with bent, head the king-fool 
answered: "You are an angel of God and I am a 
poor sinner. Permit me a cell in a monastery and let 
rue give myself to the service of the One on high 
that I may purify my soul in holy repentance." The 
angel shook his head and disappeared. When the 
King's staff entered the hall the fool likewise had dis- 
appeared: but in a purple cloak the King knelt on 
sacred place in holy prayers. 

And the memory of that just and wild monarch 
is being blessed and cherished to the present day. 

76. Haughtiness is one of the greatest human 
faults, and is also the cause of many bad crimes. It 
is a disease of the human soul, hard to be kept under 
control, which can be checked only by the application 
of the strongest remedies. What other remedy would 
have been able to break the arrogant will of this 
Sicilian king and make a good man out of him? We 
ourselves would stand helpless. Our own means for 
the care of diseases of the soul are penitentiaries and 
in>ane asylums. 

I have said before that the holy spirit does not 
only possess a superhuman intelligence, but likewise 
has many means at command of which we are totally 

rant. 

The spirit guide of the king knew what he was 
doing. He understood that the time under his treat- 
ment would be beneficial. 

My grandfather, while I was still a small boy, 
told me how Napoleon Bonaparte, with whom he was 
at Moskow in the midst of pride was followed by dis- 
aster. 

"We stood upon a hill," my grandfather said, 
"when we saw the city of Moskow for the first time. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 119 

Napoleon, sitting upon his steed with his arms crossed 
over his breast must have had many a plan, for, at 
once he reached his hand towards Heaven, and direct- 
ing his eyes upward he exclaimed: "Up there thou 
art the governor — but I am the governor down here." 

The same night the Russians burned their own 
houses and thousands of French soldiers died from 
frost and starvation. After that there came the down- 
fall of Xapoleou, until at last he was banished to the 
island of St. Helena. 

Mostly by what we term evil our cure is accom- 
plished. Evil, if not killed in the germ will develop 
unto its highest stage and then, through a severe 
stroke of fate, which forces the soul into helpless de- 
spair, it will be punished or eradicated, until the law 
or the love of the guide is satisfied. 

Experience which, under such conditions cause 
the soul to tremble, are stored up for all times and 
leave a lasting impression for improvement. The 
soul will never forget its error and not commit it in a 
next existence. The soul will be good. 

Although the new material body knows nothing of 
all that, yet, does the soul influence the same. The 
faculty of that part of the brain which brings forth 
certain labor is likewise larger than before the victory 
or experience in the previous life. And the soul which 
has become pure, through merit, but not through 
tk grace," now leads a holy life. 

The King of Sicily repented, but whether the 
emperor of the French repented after his fall I could 
not tell. But taking for granted that it had not cured 
him then there is another existence before him, which 
would prove to him an existence of disappointment, 
of disgrace and dishonor, until a complete victory 
over his arrogance had taken place, and he has thus 
come to believe in a being who is above all beings and 
wi>er than all understanding, both in heaven and here 
below. 



L20 I \ ri. and JUSTICE; OB 

A haughty man must come to fed that he is noth- 
ing, absolutely nothing, without the love and mercy 
which is the cause of all creation. 

Man, with all his self-esteem and haughtiness, 
cannot make a blade of grass grow, though he know 
all its component parts. Neither can he, when sick- 
ness befalls him, say for certainty that he will conquer 
the disease. Could man but learn the lesson that he 
is nothing of himself, but depending entirely upon 
higher power and unchangeable laws, he would avoid 
a great deal of pain which now is the result of arro- 
gance and self-estimation. 

77. "Thou shalt believe in a God — in a Being 
which stands above all powers of heavens and of 
earths — in a Being which leads every fate — in a Being 
which can lower thee to the very dust, but which, like- 
wise, can raise thee unto the highest stage of Being — in 
a being holy, above all — all — holy, in a Being, in 
whom not to believe would be wicked, and woe — woe 
unto him! 

78. This: u Woe — woe is me," each one will 
exclaim as he steps over into the world of spirits and 
sees, unfolding before his very eyes the course of his 
earth life, with all its evil against his fellow men and 
all deceptions against God and His laws— the voice of 
nature in and about him. 

This k * Woe — woe unto him" is not a barbaric 
method of God to threaten us, as we are accustomed 
to imagine: it is a "woe" which we call at our- 
selve> as we consider our evils in the face of the moral 
and human laws, as we consider our evils against the 
common sense of man and the harmony of the social 
order. Jt is a woe in the face of punishments of ex- 
piation, of justice on the whole, which demands strict 
justice for every evil dral committed upon our neigh- 
bor. It is a "woe" for time lost which can never 
"onie buck, for the disgraceful misuse of the offered 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 121 

love and help by the loved ones above. A " woe " to 
consider that he has again to commence at the be- 
ginning under sufferings and severe trials in double 
form. 

" Woe unto me — what have I done? Wiry did I 
not follow the voices of my former experiences and 
the conscience of my soul?-' So he will exclaim and 
feel his heart pangs. " Why did I, fool- hearted, seltish 
man. direct all my attention and aim to such an end? 
What good will the money do me now and all other 
substance which I gained by sacrificing my powers and 
my thought \ 

"Woe unto me," all the wrong which clings to all 
this early good it is now my own. All my desire was 
how to gain and how to hold. To take advantage 
over my neighbor I called "doing business." But it 
was not business. It was all wrong. I took wherever 
I could, with rich or poor, and wherever deception 
could help me to a business profitable to myself, I 
took advantage of the same. Cheating the poor! 
Woe is me! My money I loaned to the needy, but 
not without receiving the interest of the usurer. I 
never helped him out of distress, and where I did so 
to appearances I did it with a selfish aim in view. 
Woe is me! The justice which stands alone before 
God and my beloved ones demands a strict account. 

79. Through my perceiving and repentance I 
am permitted to commence again my wasted existence 
— to lead another and a new life. This is my consola- 
tion. And how I thank thee, Father of All, that 
Thou doest not leave me "forever in hell," in this 
"trouble of the soul," face to face with those loved 
ones upon whom I have brought disgrace by my 
actions! I thank Thee from the depth of my heart 
that Thou has sent me a means by which, through re- 
incarnation. I am enabled to reconcile myself. Gladly 
and joyfully I undertake another life. I promise to 



122 i a it. and .11 sri< i;: m; 

better myself, and my next existence shall be marked 
bv the absence of all selfishness to the well-being of 
act. Try me, Heavenly Father, that I may return 
pure! 

80. How will this new existence be? Friends I 
cannot hope to find, as I made no friends. Those 
only were my friends at whose expense I found an 
advantage and a profit. As justice demands expia- 
tion even for the smallest wrong, a life full of disap- 
pointment is awaiting me and wherever I direct my 
steps I shall find myself cheated. Yet I go, with the 
firm determination to use my time, and instead of 
directing my life towards frauds and deception I will 
direct my efforts towards knowledge and a spiritual 
life. 

SI. In our present age there have formed all 
kinds of monopolies and syndicates, which have by 
means of their money centered into their hands the 
only trade of some necessity of food, like coffee or 
sugar, who have thus crushed all opposition and con- 
trol the prices of all the markets of the world, while 
at the same time the prices are often increased to be 
double of the real value. 

By means of the earthly position given to them 
by the hand of Providence they are utilizing their 
gift for the purpose of selfish gain, which becomes 
not less than criminal, as it is directed over millions 
of human beings who crouch beneath the burden 
of labor and high prices. They cause many a 
poor widow to suffer famine and many a poor 
child to starve, all on account of their un- 
limited selfishness, which is a blot on our Nine- 
teenth century civilization and a "misuse of those 
gifts of God intended for a better application— and 
— "O irony of all human institutions and human jus- 
tice." there is not to be found one law against such 
evil among the mass of laws enacted by the law makers 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 123 

of the civilized world! Millions of people suffer un- 
der the pressure of selfishness of a few -wicked indi- 
viduals, which term themselves Christians. Instead 
of following the example of Christ, who gave his dear 
life (his blood) for the preservation of the human race 
that it may grow and thrive and progress; to-day 
these nominal Christians gather together "in His 
name" to take the life blood from earth. 

82. If, in spite of His high example and the most 
humane of all teachings, such who pride themselves 
to bear His name, try to lead to destruction the earth 
and plunder wherever they may lay their hands, if 
there were not to be found at least some good men, 
how long do you think the world would exist? Would 
not a just God destroy the world by drouth, crop fail- 
ure and other calamities and turn it into a veritable 
desert, had not a high and just spirit (Christ) appeared 
and by laying down His own life prevented the de- 
struction of the earth and taken the same under His 
own supervision. Have we not examples in the 
world's history and do not geological researches, as 
for instance in Mexico, show to us as a fact, the de- 
struction of entire civilized races and countries. And 
surely not on account of their spirituality but rather 
because of their corruption it w T as that they were de- 
stroyed. And the Soul said: "I will not destroy it 
(the city) for ten's (righteous) sake. — Gen. xvii, 22. 

Who is surprised now that Christ as he eat bread 
with his apostles, said: "This is my body — this is 
my blood " which I shed for the good of the earth. 
For the sake of one, just one, the Father sustains the 
earth. He, (Christ) was the good and just one, on 
account of whom the earth remains intact and brings 
forth food and drink abundantly for the sustenance 
of her children. He brought justice out of corrup- 
tion that it became possible for the earth, not only 
morally, but even spiritually, to work itself out of 



134 i a ri. and JUSTICE; OR 

corruption into the higher sphere of progression. By 
undertaking charge of the planet Earth it means: 

End of all corruption, end of her deception and cruel- 
tie- and vices, and a gain of victory out of selfishness, 
a beginning of a free and undisturbed blessedness 
upon a planet of brothers. 

It is fortunate, indeed, that, although robbing 
monopolies and syndicates increase to the detriment 
of human rights, and while, under their oppressions, 
thousands are made to suffer, yet there are sufficient 
good and righteous men left for whose sake the earth 
is being saved. Yet we may well believe that the 
crock is brought for water, only 'till it breaks, until 
it meets with its inevitable fall. 

It is through better experience alone that the 
various peoples and nations introduce liberal and just 
laws. Without experience there is no wisdom and no 
moral law. 

64 Woe — Woe ! " Indeed, those human spirits have 
come to exclaim when their last hour strikes on earth, 
for in the face of humanity the cry of the laborer 
and the sufferings of the poor, they have brought 
upon themselves the perspiration of heavy labor, 
blood, woe, dissention and want, death, and the curses 
of thousands of their fellow-beings. Justice, which is 
the same for all, will demand severe expiation. There 
is no escape from the hand of justice and her 
judgment. 

O, ye foolish ones ! who think that earthly laws 
cannot reach you, from justice ye cannot escape. Ye 
are to be pitied, more even than the poor ones whom 
ye rob — for all — all — ye have done unto yourself. 
Whatever ye have done unto your brethren, it falls, 
even unto the smallest details, upon your own head. 
44 Do not unto others what you do not wish done unto 
yourself." Bui "Love thy neighbor as thyself.*' 
These royal commandments of Christ everyone should 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 125 

preserve in his heart and follow the same, and the 
kingdom of heaven would be gained. 

83. Pride and haughtiness are terrible diseases. 
They are the offspring of selfishness and it demands 
radical remedies to rot them out of human nature. 
We have seen that already in the two examples of the 
King of Sicily and of Napoleon. Whenever these two 
evils have been eradicated from the human breast, 
then better times will dawn. This every man can 
well understand, for then we will no longer live, each 
one for himself alone and elevate and push forward 
their own great "I." We will then look out for the 
well-being of others as well, and live as a race of 
brothers. Look at the bees and the ants : One for the 
other. The harmony in the life of those little insects 
is far in advance of the laws and orders in human so- 
ciety. All these little insects work in harmony one 
for the other, and therefore seem to be very happy. 

Si. What is it after which we strive? Is it 
money or happiness? It is happiness. But common 
happiness we shall never gain by means of money! 
As soon as selfishness is abolished, mone} 7 will lose its 
value and we are contented without the same, for then 
no one will suffer hunger or want — none will care and 
tremble and despair: "What shall we eat and what 
shall we drink?" (Matt. vi:31-3i.) 

He knows, that as he does his duty in his care 
for others, these will care for him in turn as one bee 
cares for the other, and the blessing of fertility will 
be upon earth and bring forth in abundance. 

But as long as the soul is diseased with the worst 
of all diseases — selfishness — man cannot be happy upon 
earth, cannot gain true brotherhood. The disease must 
be healed through experience; it must spread overall 
nations until its utmost limit, until the nations are 
nauseated and full of abhorrence, and then it will heal 
itself. 



L26 FATE AND JUSTICE: OR 

What even are wars, but the outcome of selfish- 
ness? "A kingdom of brothers," or as Christ calls 
it. •• The Kingdom of God," would know no war. 

B5, Whenever this selfishness has fallen then has 
conic the end of the world (the end of corruption), 
and in its place conies " Love," brotherly love, Good- 
ness mercy- well-wishing, soberness, truth and rev- 
erence. All evil has lied. All will stand for each 
other and labor and be contented. It will be the time 
of happiness! Love and contentment form the new 
world and the new republic of brotherly love — the 
Kingdom of God. 

Earthly goods do not make man happy. But the 
feeling of purity and contentment do. He only who 
can be contented can be happy. 

Whenever selfishness has fallen, then the earth has 
made a step forward and it will step out of the stage 
of a planet of expiation into that of a planet which 
holds a race of brothers and happy human beings. 

86. It will yet cost a great many experiences to 
the human race, it will have to suffer many heart pangs 
and many woes, much work and much oppression, 
until it works itself out of all those social evils and 
arrives at a united and undisturbed happiness. It 
must be plain, that one single earthly existence would 
be insufficient, with the experiences of a few years, to 
be an intelligently ripe being and arrive at that condi- 
tion where hatred and selfishness cease, to be without 
prejudice, beings of pure brotherly love, wise beings 
witliout ill, so that the happiness of the wise and the 
great shall smile upon them. 

We all know that impure, unwise, selfish beings, 
of which our earth contains so many, cannot call a 
world of happiness their own, until they forsake all 
those lower tendencies of their natures. Vet by virtue 
of the law of justice and the law of progression, fa- 
vored by the spirit guides of humanity, the time must 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 127 

come when the mass of humanity shall enjoy paradise 
upon earth and lead a high moral life, in the midst of 
the contentment of pure happiness. 

ST. " Let the little ones come unto me!" How 
short are the experiences of thousands of human be- 
ings who die in childhood, and likewise the experiences 
of countless uncivilized savages. Have the children 
and those who have grown up in ignorance, although 
they are the children of earth and the children of 
God, have the} 7 a right to enjoy the blessedness with 
us? Can the}' help it that they died early in life, or 
that civilized society did not civilize the savage? Cer- 
tainly they have a right. And yet we cannot associate 
with them, as we are well aware that ignorance and 
inexperience are followed by so many evils, and that 
in the new Kingdom of God, or in the common pure 
life there may not return the old evil. Our blessed- 
ness — the coming reign of brotherhood — will be a 
reign of mercy, goodness, intelligence and science, 
and our social laws will be: "Love with the care for 
one another.' 7 

88. As a child, who died at an early age (and 
their names are legion, for whom love has been given 
and tears have been shed), cannot have the experience 
of an old man, then, if re-incarnation were a theory 
merely, the dearest and best which we had ever loved 
and covered with caresses would be expelled from our 
kingdom of brotherhood. This would likewise be so 
in case of the savage, of the idiot and the unschooled. 
These could never take part in the higher life, while 
as children of the same father they would all have 
equal rights according to their efforts and their earn- 

m £ 3 ' 

If we did not already believe in re-incarnation 

then we would have arrived here at a great obstacle, 

since the ignorant and those who have not advanced 

cannot form a Heaven with those who are pure and 



128 1 A IK AND JUSTICE; OB 

wise. In order to overcome this obstacle let us make 
a few more observations: 

89. Experiences are the results of life, no mat- 
ter how life has been led. Thequantity of experience 
depends upon the extent of the life-time, and why 
should not one receive lime therefore as well as the 
other? If we strive for perfection, which ean come 
through experience alone, then we need a good long 
life in order to gain it. If this were not so then the 
law of progression would be a farce and it would not 
be necessary to grow in years. Our future happiness 
would then depend entirely upon a separate act on 
the part of God. AVe would then not know who of 
the two would train blessedness, the old experienced 
man. who has passed through the school of suffering 
and pain, or the inexperienced and ignorant little 
child. "Common sense" would tell us that the man of 
experience would be the preferred one to enter into 
an intelligent Kingdom of Heaven. But then, we 
may well ask: Why do there die daily thousands of 
little children at such tender ages without having 
gained intelligence? Where is the justice that so 
many others should have the advantage to live longer 
and become enriched by experience that they alone 
can go to that place whither all are drawn? 

Or should the ignorant child which is still in need 
of human training have an advantage over the old ex- 
perienced man? If so— why then do not all of us die 
young? Does it not seem as though one thing coun- 
teracted another? Which must be lost, age or youth? 
Wisdom or ignorance? Does not every one give to 
the child a heaven into the grave, simply because of 
parental love which already lies in the nature of man 
and do not all of us think of the children who have 
passed into the great world of spirits, as little angels? 
Should perhaps the grandfather go to hell while at the 
passing away of his grandchild he feels the tears come 






THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 129 

into his eyes and for a hist time he kisses its icy brow? 
If both should enter the other world at the same time 
— the child and the grandfather — ignorance and wis- 
dom, which would be accepted into the kingdom of 
blessedness 1 

All doubts must be expelled in the consideration 
of the nature of creation that there is a greater de- 
gree of infinitely higher intelligence in the world of 
spirits than on earth. 

Wherever the idiot and the insane, the ignorant 
and the dull, the rascal, the cheat and the evil and ill 
have their abode, there cannot be a kingdom of bless- 
edness, although the good and the vise ma}' be in a 
vast majority. It would be a continuation of the same 
conditions merely as they exist on earth. 

Without a doubt, it is the pure human spirit 
which has become wise through experience, that ar- 
rives nearest to undisturbed happiness. It is the one 
who has suffered the most and has learned the most — 
the old man. 

But what will the mother say to this, who loves 
her child? ;; It is all very well." she exclaims, "that 
the old person should have the advantage. I am well 
satisfied. I have suffered myself, but my poor and 
innocent child, what shall become of it, since it could 
not help it that an early death cut off its career on 
earth, and that it died thus ignorantly. I can never 
believe that! God will accept my child likewise. Per- 
haps the children will be taught in Heaven. One hope 
of a mother — One faith for all — Why? 

90. Because it is against the inner sense of every 
human being to know an}' one of our loved ones 
unhappy, be they dying children, or cripples, or 
insane or even criminals — even the smallest which we 
love — we wish to see happy, as it is also the will of 
our Heavenly Father. 



180 fa ; i: and JUSTICE; OR 

If it had been the idea of God to school the 
children and the dllll in Heaven, then lie would not 
havp created worlds in which to have them grow up 
and be trained by experience and progression. The 
omnipotence and wisdom of God created spiritual and 
material worlds, and through birth and death relations 
and conditions have been brought about, so that what 
the spirit cannot learn without matter, it enters into 
matter (incarnates) and vice versa, what man as physi- 
cal hotly cannot receive he may gain as spirit. 

91. Re-incarnation from spirit to the human ex- 
plains to us every riddle of life. It places the child 
and all incomplete into another school of material ex- 
istence and. under the laws of justice permits them to 
progress towards that stage where the old and expe- 
rienced wise spirit, has arrived. 

I draw all men unto me. — John xii, 32. He, 
who is not horn again cannot enter the realm of the 
happy Kingdom of Heaven.) — John, iii, 3. Who 
knows but that the child which arrives on the other 
side as spirit is not actually as old if not older than 
the grandfather himself. Who knows hut it may, in 
some former existence, have been the grandfather of 
its present grandfather. The child may have lived 
before and may have suffered much and wept much. 
The child, if it had not lived before, could not, in 
justice, enjoy the same privileges which are the pos- 
session of the aged. Yet through re-incarnation the 
inequality is being removed and all are placed upon 
an equality. Even the insane and the idiotic as well as 
the inexperienced child are entitled to the same 
rights and privileges as all of us. Either of these can 
be as old and wise spirits as the healthy old man. 
Their body or deformity was only the result of some 
transgression, which they may carry as expiation, as 
a punishment or even a mission the sooner to gain 
their end in view. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 131 

92. He who incarnates himself into a healthy 
body with healthy and natural reasoning faculties and 
then misuses the same as an atheist, or to profane the 
name of God against the conscience of his heart and 
the voice of Nature and Creation, as we find so many 
at the present day. he deforms his brain and reduces 
his intellect, and in the name of justice he has to re- 
incarnate himself as he formed himself by the misuse 
of his faculties. He commences again with that part 
of his brain which he deformed and suffers under the 
same until he has developed it a^ain to human pro- 
pensity. A fool, a deformed or a profane! How can 
we conceive of these as angels? Angels of heaven are 
pure in every particular — they are pure spirits. 

In order to purify spirits of the kind mentioned, 
they must be returned to earth or to a planet even 
less advanced in order to pass through another school 
to work themselves out of the fire of purification unto 
a higher stage. Their condition as every sensible 
man can see is the one of which the Bible speaks as 
hell. *• Except a man be born again, he cannot enter 
the Kingdom of God." — John, iii, 3. 

93. Fate of children and parents. It must ap- 
pear strange to many that God in His all-wisdom can- 
not only permit it that so many children should die at 
such a tender age, but that before death comes to 
their relief they should suffer so terrible agonies. 
Many a good mother calls out in her distress: Why 
should my dear child, which has done no wrong, suf- 
fer thus? It is strange, indeed, and one should sup- 
pose that the all- wise father was powerless against 
such conditions — that his work of creation was a great 
failure, that his laws did exist in spite of all our applied 
medical remedies (or should his predestined fate be 
stronger than the art of our physicians '.) that there 
exists no mercy nor sympathy in either God or 
nature. Nearsighted man despairs in the face of such 






lo'J PATE AND JUSTICE; OB 

experiences and loses his belief In an all-guiding hand 
of God. It is, however, the will of God that we shall 
not be nearsignted, but use our brain power in order 
to think. "Seek and ye shall find." Only the weak 
will despair. So many children die under severe pain 
already at birth, or are killed by the assisting physi- 
cian — how many die already in the womb after they 
had hardly begun to live. 

What good does such a life? Why, such children 
whom not even hours arc given to live. Is the pur- 
pose of creation vain in that instance, or is it the folly 
of the parents 1 

94. If the fault were to be found in the natural 
laws, then the same would be incomplete, and it was 
the purpose of God to make all perfect. If it was 
the will of God, then it would be injustice, for it 
would indicate an acceptance of person with Him. 
To one more, to another less. God would seem un- 
just. As we know, how 7 ever, that He is just, so we 
must seek for the truth and the cause in justice. 

The All-Father has in His wisdom, instituted 
laws in nature, which carry out everything according 
to His will. If a mistake happens, therefore, it 
must occur through the w T oeful act of another will 
besides the will of God, which has interfered with 
the ordinary course of the natural law. Every inter- 
ference now demands new laws. A chemist, for in- 
stance, who wishes to analyze an ore and brings the 
same in contact with an acid introduces a natural law 
which takes its course upon the stone. Should he, 
however, add several other acids, then the first natural 
law which was at work will unite with the other laws 
an ci bring forth different results. By the addition of 
wrong material he is able to destroy all originally ex- 
pected results, and his whole analysis becomes a fail- 
ure. The fault of a failure does, therefore, not lie 
with the laws. They work unchangeably, as they are 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 133 

conditioned, but it lies with the change of the same 
by the addition of foreign elements, which bring 
forth results originally not intended. Conditions, 
time, will and justice create laws according to their 
natures. 

Every grown person know instinctively the posi- 
tion at conception, and it is his duty, therefore, not to 
act against the natural law that he may make no mis- 
take, for which he must suffer. The variation from 
the natural, as, for instance, position causes again a 
change of position of the offspring, which in turn 
causes great suffering to the mother, and sometimes 
also to the fruit. Women should note this and never 
permit an} T thing unnatural. They are the ones who 
suffer the consequences. Everything is law. 

95. Why does the child suffer at timed, since it 
cannot help it that father or mother have erred? 
When the parents have transgressed the laws, thus 
sufferings are punishments — justice. The child, how- 
ever, why should it suffer, as it knows nothing of the 
crime and yet the crime follows it to the grave? Yet 
it cannot suffer for nothing or it would not be justice. 

No one will suffer except he deserves. Every- 
thing must be justice — law. Sufferings are the result 
either of transgressions of natural laws or of those 
of moral laws. Transgression of natural law T brings 
its punishment immediately; transgression of moral 
law not however, until man arrives at the knowledge 
of the wrong. 

96. The cause of many diseases is a moral one 
and for those there grows no herb or medicine, No 
doctor can cure or prevent the same, until it has taken 
its course, i. e., until the moral wrong which w T as the 
cause of the disease has been expiated by the patient. 
If the disease is expiation, who can heal it until the 
order of nature has run its course? 

In case where the natural law has been trans- 



i:!| FAT!'. AND .n stick: OB 

grossed, the physician may. assist nature, even to the 
extent of surgical operation, but wherever justice is 
being measured out all medical aid is in vain. Justice 
demands her way until she has run her course. Christ 
was the only physician who saw into the real cause of 
the disease, on account of which he performed so 
many miracles. He treated the moral cause and as 
soon as He cured that cause He destroyed the effect of 
the same. The sufferings of our children are all due 
to moral causes, for as stated above, justice could not 
permit to let a child suffer innocently, as in the case 
where the parents commit the crime. 

If the course of a disease, by means of remedies, 
has been altered, then it will go in a different direction 
merely under increased pain. Justice and expiation 
demand a full measure of the sufferings and not an 
iota more or less. 

97. The repentant spirit always incarnates un- 
der the conditions and at the time which seems to it 
most practical and under which it will sooner expiate 
for its faults. 

Whenever the human race has progressed to that 
stage in which it has not to expiate for any more er- 
rors or crimes, then there will be no more pain or dis- 
ease in the world. 

The expiating spirit can commence its pain al- 
ready in the womb of the mother according to the 
kind of wrong committed in its former life. If we 
search after the cause of all effect, and base the same 
upon justice, then we shall soon arrive at the truth. 
If we avoid justice, however, then all our labor and 
research remain but vanity. Instead of entering the 
light we grope in darkness. Without justice nothing 
can be and nothing can come forth. Law itself does 
not exist without it. 

98. Let us try to bring a picture before our mental 
eye, which many must have >mm before. It is a vir- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 135 

gin. grown into the blossom of young womanhood, 
whose beautiful hair is reaching to the ground, sitting 
upon a bench under the shade of a majestic oak. She 
does not notice the bubbling of the near spring nor 
the leaping of the squirrel in the branches, nor does 
she listen to the songs of the many birds. With her 
large dreamy eyes she gazes towards the rocky hill- 
side opposite her upon which is to be seen the dearest 
little Kobalt, which appears half way to hide himself 
while he tries to put a sharp little arrow into his bow. 

As soon as a youth with brown locks and a pretty 
little mustache has taken place beside her upon the 
bench and has taken her hand into his, the little 
archer shot his arrow T right into her heart and she sank 
unto the bosom of the youth. While he holds the 
maiden in his tender embrace, there play, above them, 
in the oak tree, the prettiest little winged angels and 
sing of — papa and mamma. The lowest one of the 
angels resembles Cupid to a hair and has the prettiest 
little locks and is full of tender love and happy smiles. 
Those above him are likewise beautiful, but the higher 
they are, the smaller and more earnest they appear. 
They know the reason why. They are all loved ones 
and they . had waited a long time until papa and 
mamma found each other. 

The uppermost one of the angels -looks the old- 
est. It is because it has to wait the longest until it 
may materialize itself to its brothers and sisters, and 
besides that it is filled with doubts as to whether papa 
and mama are going to receive it with the same degree 
of love with which they will receive the first one, and 
furthermore, whether they are going to receive it 
at all. 

99. Out of the stem in the crown of the tree 
there grew a branch which formed a natural cross. It 
carried one of the little angels stretched out like the 
body of Christ. ***** 



186 



I A IK AM) .11 STICK: OR 



A year has passed and wo see the virgin a^ain 
this time as a happy mother, leaning over a little" bed 
and smiling and wondering at the little darling 
wrapped up in its folds. She stands tip-toe and holds 
up a finger to warn herself against making any noise. 
I hen she says to herself: " He sleeps so beautifully. 
But I fear he is not quite well. He sleeps with his 
eyes half open. Now he smiles and works his little 
tongue in his mouth as though he were in conversation 
with some one. Perhaps he dreams of his papa-— or 
mamma!" 

The little one would be well able to tell its mama, 
if it only had trained its body for speech. His answer 
would have been short, about like this: "I was upon the 
oak tree, dear mama, with my other brothers and 
have told the lowest one that now soon the time arrives 
when he, too, may take the road which I have opened— 
and then we both laughed." The young mother did 
not see nor think of that picture which she saw while 
a dreaming virgin. Perhaps she would have paid more 
attention had she had any idea that the little archer 
would be her first child, and that all the other little 
angels were related spirits who waited for her to be- 
come a mother that they might be re-incarnated, and 
that the little angel upon the cross was her redeemer, 
who would sacrifice himself for his parents out of 
pure love, in so far that he takes the cross of the 
parents upon himself. 

99. How little do we understand the sufferings 
and complaints of the children and how much more 
considerate would we be towards those little innocents 
is we took into consideration what all they are to us. 
If I say and insist upon it that children rear and 
tram their parents, who would believe me? And 
who ever does understand it, would not he be good to 
them? Our pride repels against it, that we, the^grovvn 
ones should be trained by the children. Yet in spite 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 137 

of that, it is so and the little ones ask no questions. 
How then can children do that, as in the tirst place 
they have do knowledge of the errors of their parents, 
and secondly, are without language or understanding I 
Such missions the higher spirits undertake before 
their incarnation. For before the time all the weak- 
ness of the parents lies open before them and it is 
quite possible that the parents are behind the spirits 
to be incarnated, both in morals and spirituality. 
The little child trains its parent in order that it may 
bring its own training unto the right road, or in other 
words, it elevates the parent to that stage which it 
demands for its own development, for parents upon a 
low moral level are not able to rear high spirits. The 
training of the parents by the children gradually 
comes to a close as the children become independent 
and old. Whenever the child reaches that age in 
which it begins to think, then it needs the careful 
guidance of the parent, and especially all their reason, 
in order to distinguish whether its actions are tracea- 
ble to a higher power or whether its own character is 
the cause of its carrying out its own will. According 
to that the parents must lead the training of the child. 
Wherever there is discontent and dissention between 
parents or even an absence of love, where, perhaps, 
besides some high talents and virtues there are some 
very low inclinations, in the midst of such misfortune 
there frequently steps a little citizen who has taken 
upon himself the mission of a savior, to carry the 
cross of the parents in order to bind them forever in 
love and peace. In many cases where the hand of 
justice nas brought man and wife together, it is nec- 
essary to implant love because love was not the true 
motive of their marriage, but external cause only. 
As has been explained before, their former exist- 
ence may have been worked by hatred towards one 
another, and now it has to metamorphose into love 
against their will. 



188 



i \ i i: and JUSTICE; ok 



A related spirit who is interested in harmony and 
elevation of the two, undertakes the office of recon- 
ciliation, brings the two together and plants love. As 
harmony becomes greatest there he steps in among 

them as their child, as a redeeming ana-el who holds 
together the loose tie which hound father and mother 
and hinds them together in lasting love. 

In order that the duty of parents to the children 
and the mission of the children for the improvement 
of parents may be better understood, I will relate a 
short passage out of my own life. I myself bear wit- 
ness to the absolute truth. 

100. Gaston Melano. The mysterious and 
strange circumstances under which I found my dear 
girl, and married her, made me believe, even at that 
time that we too had been destined for one another 
from the beginning. I mean that it seems to be de- 
termined by fate that two shall find each other, no 
matter though they may be raised at opposite corners 
of this globe. That, however, justice may be the 
underlying cause of all connections, about that I had 
at the time not the remotest idea. I had likewise no 
idea of the fact that children were presents of God, 
for at the time I was an atheist; although in my child- 
hood I had received a religious training by a very 
devout uncle. Times, however, change, and with 
times the views of men, and these latter mostly 
by experiences and by the changes of fate. I 
loved my young wife much and yet I learned very 
soon that I was the only one in love. I often found 
her alone, weeping about her misfortune. This caused 
me great pain and I must call it the most severe expe- 
rience of my life. "The happiness of both our lives 
had been ruined," I thought, and wept likewise. 
What do such young people know. Soon there came 
the worst, discontent, enmity, quarrel, etc. I too, be- 
gan to feci myself unhappy for I loved her in spite of 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 139 

all. After a year a little sou was born to as. We 

went into a foreign country and tried to found our 
own home. Our child — as a neighbor woman told us 
was a real angel, and such children could not live 
long. I had never forgotten this prophetic saying and 
should soon learn the truth of her prophecy. We 
did not understand our child— neither of us. In- 
stead of taking it to our heart under mutual caresses 
and to come closer together under the fortune of our 
child, we remained distant and in anger we would at 
times even strike the crying baby. I remember it 
plainly, and must admit it to my own disgrace — and 
do it iu order to warn other parents — that once as the 
little being, in spite of all words continued to cry, I 
struck its little open hands and commanded it to si- 
lence. Think of it, to strike an eight months old 
child in a family quarrel! But now the little fellow 
fell sick and sank fast. The physician did his best. 
But what medicine could cure our moral disease, 
which would have been remedy merely for our child? 
A few days later, going home from my work I meet 
the physician coming from my house, who upon in- 
quiry tells me that my child shows a marked improve- 
ment and that he has great hope for its speedy recov- 
ery. As I come home an hour afterwards I find my 
wife sitting beside the cradle and busy with handi- 
work and she remarks: ''Gaston sleeps so long and 
so curiously!" One glance into his cradle and my 
whole body trembled — for I loved him. It was im- 
possible for me to think of his dying, and yet, he was 
dead; relieved from all his suffering. We were not 
worthy of him. My wife commenced to weep bitterly. 
She too had expected anything rather than that any 
one of us should die — and I wept likewise. 

No one need ever think that God does not visit 
those whom He loves! The punishment followed us, 
and our fate was established. One week after this event 



140 l \ ii: and justice; OR 

my wife and I were both stricken down with gall fe- 
ver at the same time so that neither of us were able to 
reach the physician, who was our next neighbor, and 
lived but a gunshot from our bouse. We laid down 
upon the bed and were not able to raise until we were 
accidentally (?) discovered by neighbors. Having 
hardly recovered I fell a victim to a terrible case of 
typhoid fever, so that the physician had -to resort to 
the extreme remedies to restore me to health, which 
he no doubt accredited to his skill rather than the will 
of God, who was determined that I should expiate. 
When I had improved so far that I could walk 
about by aid of a stick, my wife and I fell 
victims to fever and ague, which in spite of 
quinine and other remedies did not leave us 
us for over a year. In order to get relief from the 
fever we removed to the high north of the United 
States, where we were shaken by it during a long 
winter. Even after the fever had left us, we met 
many severe strokes of fate. Soon we directed our 
steps southward again and. landed in Omaha, Xeb., 
where I left my wife and went to Texas to search for 
my fortune. Now I had surely met my fate! As I 
found myself alone, without wife and child, my des- 
tiny seemed to step into its rights and began to chas- 
tise me from a different direction. Sufferings and 
woes are the rod by means of which the Heavenly 
Father chastises those of his children whom He loves. 
It was not disease which chastised me this time, but 
hunger, exposure and despair. Everything was tried 
to bring me back to a belief in a Heavenly Father 
and in the Saviour whom He had sent. Even to-day I 
cannot understand how it was ever possible that a man 
with healthy senses, who, at one time was a religious 
boy. could in the face of an intelligently created nature, 
in the face of his own wonderful mechanism, bean athe- 
ist. God be praised that this high hand hath chastised 
me that I may now receive the enjoyment of His work. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 141 

It was in the month of January, very cold and 
the ground was covered with six inches of snow, that I 
was walking the streets of one of the larger Texas cities 
without hope of work or shelter. Under the wooden 
sidewalks and under the lumber piles of a lumber 
yard I made my night quarter. I had tried unsuc- 
cessfully to make my way on a freight train but did 
not succeed, and I would starve rather than beg, for 
I always retained hope of linding work. But all in 
vain! Out of my trunk, which I left in charge of a 
countryman, I took my gun, which was to protect 
me against starvation, and undertook to walk west- 
ward—all alone, for in the city I would have suc- 
cumbed. After a journey of about eighty miles I 
had left the last abode of men behind me and found 
myself in the vast plains without tree or shrub, not 
even water to quench my thirst. Although my steps 
were directed westward, yet I would stop at times 
and reason or talk with myself — had I no one else 
with whom to converse? Whither, whither? I asked 
myself in this vast wilderness. When will this end? 
When shall I find a house? If I die here, no one will 
care. I am alone, and if I should find a village, who 
guarantees me that I have not reached it, too, in vain 
as everywhere else in Texas? Why should I wander 
thus away from home, from wife, from love and into 
destruction \ Why not return while I yet have a 
chance? But why return? Do I not come from 
there with all my bitter experiences? Onward to the 
West. It cannot be worse than it has been. Thus 
encouraging myself 1 hurried onward towards the 
West. The happy time of my youth passed through 
my mind, and I compared the beautiful country of 
my cradle with this endless desert upon which my foot 
trod painfully hard. 

Now it became clear to me how easy, without 
even a tear I had left my beautiful home, in order, as 



1 12 i ah: and JD8TICE; OB 

I thought, to find a home in foreign lands where I be- 
lieved that milk and honey flowed. A severe longing 
pain for home overcame me for my beloved Switzer- 
land, and to that added the oppressive feeling of be- 
ing alone. Never before had I realized the truth in 
the songs of my childhood and 1 commenced singing 
thr old song of my home mountain, and as I think of 
home the tears are coming, hot. hot tears and my soul 
begins to be thoughtful. "Whence my fate? I ask. 
God alone could send "fate," and at last, gaining a 
hill I fell down upon my knees— the first time since 
the years of my boyhood— reaching my. hands 
towards heaven — I, the atheist — weeping bitterly and 
pouring fourth my soul in prayer. Thine, Thine 
again, O, my Heavenly Father, Thou, Thou alone 
canst guide me. Why, oh Why dost lead me in this 
way — oh no— I deserve it. I knew Thee once — and 
in my wisdom I have denied Thee. Now Thou pun- 
isheth me. A dear sweet child — and its mother — hadst 
Thou not given both to me( "An angel" the woman 
said — J believe it — on Him, too, I deserve to be pun- 
ished. O, Father, forgive me! I promise never to 
depart from Thy way again and from to-day on I will 
be truthful again. O, Father, give him back to me, 
my deai- child, that it may guide its father. Yet for 
a long while I wept and with my hands directed 
towards Heaven 1 prayed without words, and at last 
I arose, strengthened in spirit with the words passing 
over my lips: '.'In the name of God from now on!" 
and holding out my riirlit hand J said: "Then lead 
your unhappy father, my dear child!" Much encour- 
aged, from now on I followed my road westward, 
easier at heart and feeling all the time that my angel 
child was guiding me and my loneliness disappeared. 
After a march of two hundred miles I reached 
the little town of C. where I bought a small business 
on time payments SO that, three months later, 1 was 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 143 

able to send for my wife, and a year later we built 
ourselves a little rock house upon a two acre piece in- 
side of the city limits, so that we had a welcome home 
in a foreign land in which the three of us moved — 
my wife and I and a little son. 

We were over happy to have another child. We 
loved it with rnore sense than the first one although 
we were put to many trials. 

101. About five years later a third child was 
presented to us —a beautiful boy with black eyes and 
blonde hair. As for the first time 1 took the little fel- 
low into mj arms I suddenly heard a plain voice out 
of Heaven saying: ''Here I give Gaston back to you 
— your child — make good what you did to him." We 
love the little one with all our heart and were quite 
willing to expiate and pay "unto the last penny" and 
to improve ourselves. And the trials did not fail to 
come. 

The little fellow T was very restless, and as we 
frequently hear, a •"spoiled" child. He tried our 
anger and our patience, our sense and our love very 
severely. Whole nights he demanded to be carried 
or cradled. Never before in niy life had I tried to 
play a musical instrument, but to please this boy I 
learned to play the mouth organ that it was a delight. 
The boy was to both of us a regular moral barometer. 
Whenever he would not look kindly towards one or 
the other of us it was sure that we had done some 
wrong either in our thoughts or in our actions. 
After we had found out what was the trouble, and 
then only after we had determined to do better, was 
it possible to get a smile from that child. If any one 
neglected to be caressing, then he set in alarm the 
whole house until the one took him and caressed him. 
Whenever we had visitors we could tell by his actions 
whether they were good or bad people. In the 
neighborhood of bad people he would cry terribly and 



1 11 fa n; ami JUSTICE; OB 

become pale as death. In order to guard the health 
of our dear child, its mother was forced not to go 
calling, since only at home did he feel well. When 
both oi us parents quarreled, he would become sick 

ami sink very fast, bo that we feared the worst, and 
we were glad to unite for the sake of our dear child. 

When he was eighl months oFU — (the age of his 
death at his former existence), lie fell very sick; I 
don't know why. He sank very fast and soon he laid 
there like a living skeleton. With trembling heart 
I saw that he approached his end, and J remained at 
home from my work. I prayed often from the depth 
of my heart that the good Lord might not take the 
child from me again, as I loved it so dearly, and did 
not know what sin I had committed this time. I held 
the child in my arms and expected dissolution to take 
place almost any moment. I soon saw that all efforts 
were vain and I could do nothing but adjust myself 
to the unavoidable and into the will of God. The 
child looked once more into my face and tried to 
smile, then it dropped its little head lower over my 
arm: it drew a long breath and its eyes became dim. 
"Mamma!" I called with a suppressed voice, "he is 
dying. Look once more into his face." She saw the 
truth but too plainly and uttering a shrill cry she ran 
ginto the next room and fell upon her knee, wringing 
her hands and praying while hot tears crept down 
over her face — (the first time that I saw my wife pray.) 

I sat with the dying child, which seemed now to 
Bpend its last breath, near the entrance to the next 
room, and called to my wife: "Now mamma, it 
is over!" A second cry which went to heaven and 
with a jerk the child raises itself up and turns round 
so as to look through the door where it could have 
seen its mamma had the door been open. 

I hardly knew what happened to me. After I 
had recovered a little from my surprise, I stepped 






THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 145 

with him to his praying mother, laid the child in her 
arms and said: He has heard you and has come 
again. He has seen that you are in earnest. 

Oat of the depths of our hearts there rose pray- 
ers of praise and thankfulness, and just then there 
sounded another voice from heaven, saying: " He 
has been given back to you. Now you have merited 
him.' 1 

After this hour the boy began to improve. He 
was perfectly well within a week and is alive to-day. 
Yes, even to-day (1892), he trains his parents as well 
as his brothers where it seems to him to be necessarv. 
and gives to us many an enigma of life which baffle 
even his father. 

102. Although no spirit incarnates himself upon 
earth except he has obligations here, to reconcile him- 
self for errors committed or to adopt what he failed 
to learn while here before, yet I must suppose that 
the arrival of this child was not for schooling merely, 
but likewise for a mission. Schooling for his own 
sake and mission for the sake of progress of his loved 
ones. I have no doubt but that those for whom he 
suffered and died were at one time his greatest enemies, 
but through the imitation of the example of Christ, 
the enemy is being made a iriend; hatred becomes love 
and dissention unity. 

Should we but learn to understand the little chil- 
dren (before they need our training), could we learn to 
read in their innocent and heart-penetrating eyes and 
study them, we should be surprised how much we 
would learn. For we must not forget to remember 
that it is possible they are higher spirits than father 
or mother themselves, and besides that they stand un- 
der the protection of their spirit guides; why then 
should we in pride, reject to learn from our children, 
especially as they are ready-to do everything for us? 
God in His wisdom has adjusted everything for the 



1 16 PATE AM) JUSTICE; OB 

best. He gives to us every means and ways to foster 
our progress, if mc would but believe and use every 
effort to think logically. 

Is then the training of the parents by the children 
so unnatural, especially if we consider that an intelli- 
gent guide, even without the means of language, leads 
the adult merely through the organs of inner feeling, 
as his (the guide's) Intelligence is always purer and 
more perfect than our own in consequence of which 
he is well able to train us and to lead us on? 

103. Modern Grimes. It is with a feeling of 
terror that I pronounce the right word over crimes — 
crimes which are committed day after day and are fol- 
lowed by expiation and terror. And all these com- 
mitted under the mistaken idea of deriving a personal 
benefit, no matter though it he at the expense of a 
life or not. To live or be allowed to live is the first 
great blessing of man. 

Who can tell whether the all-good Father is going 
to give to us a child again, which we owe, which at 
one time we did not give a moral training, or which, 
through onr neglect failed to be somebody in life, and 
ended in crime (all as the result of our own bad life?) 
Who knows, but that it, with help of higher spirits, 
did not rise as high out of its humble place before its 
re-incarnation that you are not worthy to receive it as 
child in order to train it to its advantage this time, so 
that a loving change might be offered you, through 
expiation, to reconcile what you committed? Who 
knows but that such a chance would be offered to you 
through the birth of a child? Who knows but that 
even to-day there is destined to you a child, an angel 
spirit, which is to lead you out of the dust? (See 
Gaston.) You cannot tell but that your child wdiich 
died, your father, your mother, your loved one which 
you owned, are given back to you? And you, discon- 
tented, selfish man dares to say in a brutal way, '*No! 



THE KEV TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 147 

No! I will not, rather this or that than to have chil- 
dren again." Oh, what a terrible blow you strike into 
your own face ! 

101. The dearest, an angel — the own progress — 
that for which one asked and promised in the name of 
justice before one ? s own incarnation — it is roughly 
and harshly cast away. One is well anxious to enjoy 
the pleasures of sensuality, but if afterwards they 
show life, then abortion is being practiced and a dear 
one is, without mercy, cast into death. 

And it is quite common that spirits, for which in 
love we have shed our many tears, have offered many 
prayers upon its grave, which, attracted by our love, 
gives himself back to us, and for that purpose re- 
incarnates itself. 

It is his purpose, through his re-incarnation, not 
only to help himself to progress, but his parents like- 
wise, and thus lead all into a happy future. Parents, 
however — and so many of them with bloody hand 
they make their tears upon the graves of their dear 
ones a deception and damn themselves and their 
loving child. 

105. It is the spirit which enlivens the first germ 
of the fruit, which forces it to grow as the active 
power of matter until birth. — John, vi, 6-8. 

The germ (which is laid as organic matter) needs 
life, and as long as there is not found a spirit to the 
production matter will not be enlivened, and all 
will be in vain. Without life or spirit matter 
cannot grow. Therefore it follows that children are 
a gift of God, and that explains why so many couples 
are without children. Let us draw a picture of the 
natural condition of things about as follows: 

106. "Mother, dear, sweet mother, why do you 
kneel upon my grave and permit the hot tears over 
the loss of me to wet the ground? Look here, I am 
not lost! I am here. I live in as nice a body. This 



148 PATE AM) JUSTICE; OB 

here (pointing to the grave) is the material dress 
which J have cast off, because the law of justice de- 
mands it. Don't wee]), dear, sweet mother! AVe 
have seen your tears, and your love draws me hack to 
you. I will not leave you without your child. You 
shall have me hack. Do not weep for me any more, 
dear mother, but go and tell my dear papa." 

About like that the spirit of the child would 
speak to its mother as she is kneeling upon its grave 
and shedding tears in its memory. "If my mother 
had heard my voice," the spirit says to itself, "then 
she will tell my papa immediately. But it is sufficient 
that I should see her love and her suffering about the 
loss of me. Oh, how happy am I and how thankful 
I will show myself to my dear parents after I am 
again with them! I will train them and teach them 
that they may dwell with their child in the higher re- 
gion of happiness. I will go and make my arrange- 
ments for my earth journey." 

After the mother had imparted her feelings to the 
father, it happened that about four months later she 
became all disturbed by a newly felt life. The husband 
smiled, and at times his wife even cried, but what had 
happened could not be made undone! She complained 
of 'her trouble to her intimate neighbors and each of 
the women stood ready to assist her, and soon they 
had accomplished their aim. One evening the hus- 
band went hurried to the physician and the patient 
had a premature birth. 

Again, one day the mother knelt upon the grave 
of her dear one and laid flowers upon the sod but the 
little angel steps up with earnest and sorrowful mien: 
"Mother, what are you doing here? Why do you 
defame this little grave! Go away from here, you do 
not truly love me. Your child answered your prayer 
and you rejected and killed it. You have felt me. 
You know that a dear one has blessed your body. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 149 

"Why have you done that unto me? You have cast 
yourself away and. according to the law of justice, as 
you have cast me away, so in time wheu you try to 
re-incarnate yourself you will be cast out yourself. 
Justice must be in heavens and on earths." 

107. It is no disgrace to have children, either in 
a married or unmarried state, for children are gifts 
from Heaven, but it is a disgrace and a crime prema- 
turely to destroy them. It would be more honor- 
able for an unmarried person to expose herself to the 
foolish disgrace of the world, which of itself is sin and 
selfishness, and protect her child, than to succumb to 
the feeling of shame and reach out her hand in the act 
of murder. 

A girl who carries the result of her fall with 
courage and raises her child, stands as high in the eyes 
of God and the angels as the one who raises her child 
with the assistance of a lawful husband. What the 
world calls sin is not always such, for fate might have 
desired it so and therefore it has happened. At any 
rate, each one ought to bear in patience what Heaven 
has destined to give to her and not lay her hand be- 
tween. A bottle of medicine ma} r soon be taken, yet 
it carries long and incalculable disasters, which 
ma} r last for centuries to follow. And yet in spite of 
the voice of conscience there are persons living upon 
whom this sin rests ten fold. Woe- -woe unto them! 
They have put themselves under a terrible judgment. 

It is not in the killing of these little worms mere- 
ly. But they may be great, intelligent, yes even holy 
spirits and hold within them the highest material and 
moral benefit for the parents; under the laws of jus- 
tice .surely benefit rather than loss. 

108. Parents, and the spirits which are about to 
incarnate themselves through them, are always in some 
way related, and if there exist differences between 
them, through the re-incarnation they are equalized. 



160 FATE AM) JUSTICE; OK 

That justice which stands before God demands of 
each one of as redemption, payment and expiation 
for every wrong dovd, so t hut an equilibrium may bo 
brought about. Equality and brotherhood must be- 
come Heaven itself, and under this law there seeks, 
the debtor the creditor and the creditor the debtor. 
Thi' killed seeks the murderer and the murderer the 
one killed, in order that they may all equalize each 
other. Such equalization can be brought about only 
through re-incarnation. Through re-incarnation only 
is absolute justice possible. 

Will not the spirits of the children which by will- 
ful hand were killed before they were born, and their 
progress thus cut otf, demand expiation from their 
cruel parents? Did they not, before their re-incarna- 
tion, promise to all the holy spirits that they would 
receive all the spirits bound to them by justice, as 
children? Surely justice will be demanded, not only 
for the loss of much work and time, but also for the 
obstacles which have been placed in the way of pro- 
gress, which may have been retarded for centuries, and 
last but not least, justice will be demanded for taking 
away the chance to purify themselves without the 
deed of murder and deception. 

109. The criminal, as soon as he commits his 
deed, condemns himself immediately,' as he cuts off 
his own progress and instead of gaining purity, he 
sinks again down upon the terrible road of vice. His 
existence was not a failure merely but it became one 
of crime and terror. Whenever he as a spirit steps 
over into the other world, then there will surely be 
weeping and gnashing of teeth. For he cannot look 
back upon his loved ones left behind, with pleasure 
and gain satisfaction for his accomplishments. Upon 
whatever his eye may rest, it is dark as night, lies 
against the laws of God, lies against justice, lies 
against hi- work— murder, murder! lie sees his 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 151 

future moved into the distance. He feels that he has 
deserved no future, even as he has begrudged it to 
others. Who would wish him to receive it now? Has 
he deserved it to be received with love and tender- 
ness? Will not justice demand of him everything 
that he has done unto others? How? Let no one 
say: Who knows all that? " 

110. Who knows then how that is? Who has 
told you? Those are all pictures of your fancy. It 
is too foolish to make such excuses and to seek for 
such solutions of the problem. It would bear witness 
of a weak brain merely? But the logical conclusion 
about the result of such crime is to be found in the 
feeling of a thinking man. He feels and knows that 
justice must become law. Xo sensible man will be- 
lieve that a person who has not given any chance to 
his children to be born, after he himself wants to be 
re-incarnated, has merely to select his mother and 
then can be born again without further difficulty. 

111. To have and raise children is no easy task, 
and therefore has he alone a right to put such a bur- 
den upon parents who has deserved it, i. e. , with 
whom it is justice. He however, who has destroyed 
his own children, although they had deserved it, he 
will be the last one to be given to a mother. He must 
first deserve one. But he has not deserved one. He 
has done the reverse. He has destroyed every right 
for re-incarnation. He has destroyed his progress 
and come to a depressing standstill. An eternal 
damnation in his own created condition is his outlook. 
Deep-felt repentance, many tears and earnest prayers 
to the Father of all and to the Redeemer may be the 
only help to him. After he has improved in the 
depth of his soul he may be permitted to expiate and 
find a mother, who, as soon as he has incarnated 
himself, will kill him, or else he will die too soon in a 
natural way, according to the extent of his own early 



L52 PATE AM) JUSTICE; <>K 

action. As he has done unto his own. so it happens 

to him again. As many lives as he has destroyed, as 
many times he will incarnate himself until he has ex- 
piated for every death of which he was the cause. 
After thai it will he a great deal of trouble to him to 
rind a loving mother who will raise him. 

L12. His existence, after he has grown up, will 
be a marriage without children. He must learn to 
love children. He must learn to appreciate mothers 
with children, he must feel the pain not to be able to 
have children, and then, after real improvement on 
his part, after attaining all these virtues there will be 
nothing in the way of his progress in the next exist- 
ence. To many a one there is given a child in high 
old age as a reward of his victory. 

113. There is some complaint about the mortal- 
ity among children at the present day, and especially 
in the larger cities. Can that surprise any one? Is 
not that explained in this way? Stop! The killing 
of these little beings will be followed by expiation. 
The mortality of the children is expiation, is the effect 
of our corruption. Abortion and the destruction of 
infants by artificial means had never before reached 
BUch dimensions as in our day. And the corruption 
of the inhabitants of the cities is far in advance of 
that of the country people. 

As soon as this .terrible crime has been abolished, 
then there will not die so many children, for it is their 
purpose to live. and. by aid of their material bodies, 
to gain perfection. 

114. Paying off. Every imperfect being is 
-object to err. Since, however, perfection permits of 
no error nor impurity, then all such must be removed 
id order to gain perfection. Such removal demands 
labor and through it only can error disappear. It is 
at time- very hard labor and demands physical and 
moral struggle until victory is gained, which shall 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 153 

lead forth the soul in purity, yet not without reward. 
For reward is in the condition into which the soul 
rises, in feeling elevated and beatified. u The King- 
dom of Heaven suffereth violence (work), and the 
violent (those who work and struggle against their 
error) take it by force." — Matt., xi, 12. This strug- 
gle and violence against error is what we term 
"paying off in diligence,'' because it is through our 
own effort that the errors fall. We learn in order 
that we may progress, and if we have advanced as 
as the result of our learning, then it is our own merit 
through effort and labor. If some one approaches 
us as a teacher to assist us in our efforts in order that 
we may progress faster, even then, whatever we have 
learned is our own, although the teacher deserves 
credit for his good works in behalf of his fellowmen. 
If we have a certain fault or vice — the cause of sin — 
then we shall never be relieved of the same until we 
do ourselves violence — never without our own effort 
and earnest endeavor. 

115. If we will be pure from eveiy sin, i. e., so 
that we need no longer do it, then we must first de- 
stroy* the real cause. The cause of every sin, how- 
ever, is to be found in the low condition of the moral 
character and in the power of matter (the flesh) over 
the spirit. The eradicating of sin occurs only through 
the eradicating of its cause, and the means to bring 
this about is, in the first place, the apprehension of 
the same and then the determined will to overcome. 
Before we can see the error of our way, how- 
ever, experience must come in to teach us. The 
law of experience forces men to reason and to 
open the eyes to discern the difference between 
one's virtues and one's vices. We cannot com- 
prehend a vice until we have learned the re- 
sults which it brings about. But to see and know 
a vice is still far from conquering it. As long as the 



[64 FATE AM) JUSTICE; OK 

spirit is wreak it will be controlled by vices, and al- 
though it hates them yet will it follow in their path. 
The law of progress (experience) must, in the final end, 
bring the spirit to that state in which it will triumph 
over matter. For experience makes wise. He who 
lives long and experiences much, will know propor- 
tionately. And yet without the real relations between 
the spiritual world and the world of matter he could 
not become either morally wise or morally good. It is 
only through perception of the law of justice which is 
the same for all, and through expiation, that his spirit 
can elevate itself in moral a d humane direction and 
make a man of him. Fear of expiation, the desire for 
a higher and nobler lite and the disgrace in remaining 
behind in the face of his advanced fellow comrades tend 
to strengthen the will of his spirit. 

It is with the development of spiritual strength 
as it is with that of physical power. It will never de- 
velop without training and without use. One com- 
mences at the small and insignificant, yet as the greater 
will be demanded we find that we are in its possession 
and carry off the victory with ease. Therefore let us 
first remove small weaknesses (useless habits, for in- 
stance.) that we may be strong to overcome the 
greater. 

116. Our own will alone saves us from our sin, 
as through our will we can destroy sin by the root. 

Christ Himself does not mean otherwise when He 
says "Thysins are forgiven thee," i. e., "they will not 
be reckoned unto you.' 1 "Go — but sin no more." He 
directed the mill, not to do again. The belief that the 
will is thus able, makes the will strong, and with a 
positive will we can command an error or a vice to 
cease. At the moment when our determination is pos- 
itive, we feel an inward joy, and when the next temp- 
tation come- in our way over which we walk victori- 
ously, then the joy of our soul is great and we are con- 
tent with self-respect over a victory of self. 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 155 

While now, the knowing and seeing- of an error 
is the first requisite to its abolishment, so it takes a 
great deal of time until all errors can be abolished, 
as of course we will overcome only one error at the 
time. 

117. Xot hours merely, or days, nor a whole life- 
time and ofttimes several existences does it take to 
overcome the errors and imperfections to which we are 
subject. Every thinking man understands that very 
well. Then we must consider it simply insanity to 
believe as many churches in Christendom would have it 
thcat we can by merely repenting be washed clean from 
all our sins in the time of a few moments, by merely 
receiving a sacrament or some other useless ceremo- 
nial. In order to be clean we must be washed until 
every spot has disappeared. It is logically impossible 
in a moment to wash the soul clean from her errors 
and crimes, by the sacrament of baptism or anything 
else, even though the church may claim that such 
means a re birth, a purification from all sin and a 
guarantee of blessedness. Don't we all know very 
well that our faults and weaknesses of character dis- 
appear under no condition whatever except through 
the determination in our will and the positive efforts 
which we make? And furthermore, we know all of 
us from experience, that no one will drop a habit or 
a fault until he has come to see it as such. 

The results of faults and error and the disadvant- 
ages which accrue therefrom, are as a rule the first in- 
timations which we have of their being such, and the 
experience of this disadvantage it is which ripens the 
determination within us. to conquer such weakness. 

118. The washing away of sins is a little differ- 
ent. Under the common adaptation of the word "sin" 
we understand such wrong which we have done 
towards others (in opposition to vice which is wrong 
done towards one's self). Sin thus is the result of our 



L56 



FATE AND JUSTICE; <>i; 



vice. As a matter of fact, however, a 
hen it is committed know 
mess with 



then onl 

wrong from moral weal 



-or from indifference or 



wi 



wrong is a sin 
ingly. To do 

out use of the will 
or a decline to do 



riofht. all th 



is is sin. 



1 L9. In order to wash away sin out. of the hu- 
man breast, or rather out of the spirit brain, so that 
there is no more guilt in man, it needs a special and 
most excellent soap. No mighty word, no water nor 
any baptism with water is ever able to wash away sin. 
This can be done only and alone by the "baptism of 
lire*' of Christ, of which John the Baptist speaks: 
"He will baptize you with fire."— Matt, in, 11," i. e., 
u He will baptize you in the law of justice through 
the tire of expiation." Expiation is the only means, 
as we have shown before, wdiich is able to wash away 
all folly, ignorance and crime from the consciousness 
of the soul and thus to purify the soul at last as we 
purify gold in fire. 

120. Although the "Lamb of God" has washed 
away with his blood the sins of the world for the life 
of the world, yet our sins cannot be forgiven in the 
sense in which the church would have it. 

No man, no priest, no angels, not even Christ or 
the Heavenly Father himself can forgive sins com- 
mitted upon our neighbor except that v;e expiate 
the same, otherwise the law of equality and of justice 
would be null and void. 

The errors are forgiven as soon as sinning man 
deserves it, but the sins commited against our fellow 
man cannot be washed away until they have been 
paid for. 

L21. Christ, our high Lord, has taken the sins 
of the world upon himself, yet not in the sense in 
which the different churches explain it. He washes 
our sins through his blood, he abolishes them through 
hi- merit. He has taken our sins upon himself as a 



THE KEY TO THE PKOBLEM OF BEIXG. 157 

man who stands bail or goes security for the debts of 
another person, that they will be paid in time. He is 
our security with our Heavenly Father. He has taken 
the responsibility of this earth a cross, a heavy cross 
upon his shoulders that the earth will improve and 
progress, and set a seal upon it with his blood and 
life: 

122. He therefore must and will lead the course 
of the earth even at the present day, and rule 
the fate and destinies of the inhabitants which 
in justice he calls his children, until he has brought 
about a state of freedom from sin, of purity 
and brotherhood, and this until he has been released 
from his bail. Until now he has led all things, and 
soon he w 7 ill have formed the earth for greater happi- 
ness. It takes a long time for progress to develop, 
but just as he has led civilization on to a higher stage 
of art and invention, so now in the coming age he 
will lead on the world to a higher stage of morality 
and humanity. "No man cometh to the father (i. e. 
to a higher happiness), but through me." 

The higher degrees of civilization, however, 
demand a purer life, to gain wdiich it is necessary to 
pass through the tire of purification and expiation. 
This is the great judgment of the world, which has 
begun already. Judgment of the world [i. e. the 
earth with her inhabitants) is necessary, as the world 
could not become pure without it, nor become ready 
for progress upon the road of morals. 

The world, in an aggregate, does not differ in 
that respect from the individual. Xot until the w 7 orld 
comes to see the error of its way, and has a desire 
towards a nobler stage of being, follows atonement 
and expiation. The forces of nature, led by the hand 
of fate of thew 7 hole earth (our high Lord) will purify 
the nations and peoples of earth and cause them to 
expiate for their social evils and their godlessness. 



158 PATE AND JUSTICE; OR 

Even as the gold leaves the fire purified, so humanity 
will come forth from the punishment by experience 
more pure and divine. 

L23. Although our Hiffh Redeemer has brought 
US expiation and salvation, yet it is impossible for 
him to expiate for those crimes and vices of which 
we arc guilty day after day. It can be of no conse- 
quence whether or not the criminal joins one or an- 
other church in the belief to be washed clean by the 
blood or baptism of Christ. He need not imagine 
that he can thus, as a pure child, pass over into 
heavenly bliss, while another one suffers the penalty 
of his crime. He will find that he has to carry his 
own burden and cannot make another one responsi- 
ble. While he is responsible as he is our security 
with our Heavenly Father, yet you cannot enter into 
Heaven on account of your own lack of progress 
until you have paid the last penny. Your "Kansom" 
will remind you from time to time, and whenever j^ou 
are willing to pay off he will give you an opportunity 
to relieve yourself of your debt ''"'pro rata." 

Oh, what deception and terrible perversion of the 
justice of God is the church guilty of ! 

124. Humanity is too ungrateful for any one to 
come and through his death wash away its sins and 
make it irresponsible. Christ experienced sufficiently 
the ungratefulness of the world for all the good 
works which He showed unto them. But the world 
martyred and killed Him, and now they expect and 
demand of Him that He be responsible for their mur- 
ders and other crimes that they may escape the just 
punishment for their transgressions and enjoy the 
blessings of Heaven and all its glory for all eternity. 

125. We ask: Where would be our honor and 
glory — our own progress — unless we gained it through 
our own efforts? Why our labor, our experiences, 
our sufferings and our tears if we had no right to 
climb upwards through our own efforts? 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 159 

It is plain, that if I rob you of your hard-earned 
money, and in that way tend to bring unhappiness 
in your family that you may call me a thief or any 
other bad name. Yet what satisfaction is that to you 
if I have gone to a foreign country? Twenty years 
later I join a church as a member of the "community 
of Jesus Christ.' 1 I am happy, as the blood of Christ 
has purified me from all sin and crime through the 
baptism of re-birth, and as a reward I receive the Holy 
Ghost. I remained in good standing by paying my 
fees and soon I became one of the elders of the 
church. I crush the memory of the event that I rob- 
bed a man and find consolation for my deed in being 
a member of the church, and that, having received 
religion, it will settle my debts with the Lord. But 
what think you? 

As the hour of my death had struck and I was 
about to step before the judgment seat of God, there 
arose before the consciousness of my mind the whole 
terror of my deed in the most lively colors, and while 
my past came into my memory, I saw standing beside 
me — my victim. By cheating you out of your fortune 
I brought great misery over you and your family. I 
thought for a moment to call upon the church for 
protection, but my clear sense told me: " That can do 
you no good; you are the miserable debtor of your 
victims, and before me they all stand, and in the name 
of justice which stands for all they demand satis- 
faction. 

126. I saw no escape. I called and fell upon 
my knee, as I was used to in church, and I prayed to 
the Lord, but I saw and heard nothing of him. " Ye 
will seek me and not find me, and where I am there 
ye cannot enter."— John, iii, 21. "I never knew 
you. Depart from me, ye that work iniquity." — 
Matt., vii, 23. But after I arose from my knees, 
everything was dark and dismal about me and I felt 



160 FATE AM) JUSTICE; OR 

myself alone in despair. *i> thai the reward, is that 
the heaven for a Christian?" I asked. 

Will not you, whom I have robbed, whom I have 
disgraced, whom I have led to destruction or whom 
I have murdered, will not you demand account and 
payment from me '. 

The fact of my becoming devout or joining a 
modern church cannot undo the misfortune which I 
brought over your head, nor can it pay the debts 
which I owe to you. I must restore everything be- 
fore I can be forgiven. And God himself will be 
reconciled to me whenever my debt has been paid. 
This is the law of Christ which he has given us. 
He wills it that we do full justice to one another. 

It is logically impossible and no reasonable man 
will admit the orthodox theory, that Christ can or 
will suffer for all sins which we have or still will com- 
mit merely for the consideration of our paying the 
church which bears his name. Even if Christ would 
forgive the criminal and blot out. his guilt from the 
Book of Life, yet that would not satisfy the victims. 
The man whom I defrauded has no interest in my 
being a member of a church, nor whether or not my 
sins have been forgiven, he will demand compensa- 
tion for his misfortune and with justice too. 

The youth, whose dear one I have defamed, whose 
heart I have broken, so that he committed suicide, 
cares not for my settled account with Christ, which 
shall supply me with a heaven, as he must commence 
his existence over again on my account. He will never 
forget the terrible heart pangs which he suffered on 
account of his lost love, the result of my crime. His 
soul cries out for revenge. In justice he demands sat- 
isfaction which he finds under the law of brotherly 
love and common justice. J must feel what he felt. I 
must experience what he experienced. The smallest 
injury, the smallest pain, every insult and every ill- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 161 

spent word will fall back upon him who has dealt it 
out. I, as the transgressor, must suffer the result of 
my trnnsgression. Christ cannot do it forme, because 
without suffering- and experience we can make no prog- 
ress. How, indeed, could Christ for me, for you, for 
thousands of others, re-incarnate himself every time to 
expiate our ills? I appreciate Him too much, my 
high and noble teacher, that I would expect Him to 
go out and suffer for my crimes. While He suffered 
for m}^ transgression — I would sit in heaven among 
the joys of angels. No one would think of holding 
Christ responsible for an injury which he received 
from his neighbor, but he will look to his neighbor for 
satisfaction. Justice, in order to be justice, must be 
dealt out upon him who deserves it. 

128. Are you satisfied, after I have burned your 
house from over your head, or by means of an acid 
destroyed the sight of your eyes, or have in other 
ways sought to injure you, that after you want satis- 
faction I refer you to the fact of my paying the church 
and getting religion, and that my sins have thus been 
forgiven me, since Christ, according to the teachings 
of the church, died for me nineteen hundred years 
ago? Indeed, not. But "An eye for an eye, and a 
tooth for a tooth " you will demand. You robbed me 
of the sight of my eyes, as the result of which I was 
blind for twenty years. If the justice should be meted 
out to you. then you must suffer the same injury in 
turn. It is remarkable, indeed, what people try to 
reason into their heads against sense and conscience 
in order to find an excuse for sin and an escape from 
its penalties. 

Where would be our progress without absolute 
justice? Where and what would be the object of our 
manifold experiences and all the sufferings and defeats 
which we had to endure, if they did not bring about a 
higher blessedness through our own endeavor? With- 



162 I \ II \M» .11 SIKK; OK 



oat our own effort for the better, without our own ex- 
piation and our own reconciliation, we should never 
cease to commit the same error. If sin can be blotted 
out without our own effort, why then all those reforms 

of our social and moral institutions? We could injure 
each other to the fullest extent and do whatever the 
heart could desire, and yet level it all by merely pay- 
ing the church, for the highest spirit makes all well. 
No — no — justice rules and must rule in heaven 
and upon earth. "And righteousness shall be the 
girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his 
reins." (Isaiah, xi:5.) 

129. Because expiation demands so many bodily 
sufferings in order to mete out justice, transgression 
cannot be atoned for in the spirit world but must be 
atorned for in matter upon a planet. A house cannot 
be built in the spirit world, but on earth. The mate- 
rial body only can lose an eye, a beloved one can only 
be led astray as human being and suicide and murder 
can be committed only on a material human body. 
Robbery and stealing can take place only where there; 
are material objects. In order, therefore, to expiate 
for transgression a re-birth out of water (matter) and 
spirit becomes necessary (John iii, 3.) 

130. As the missions and the deeds of the high- 
est spirit sent to earth by the Father, were so infinitely 
above those supposed by common men, therefore ad- 
vanced spirits only can understand them. His re- 
demption, given injustice (and love is true redemption,) 
but Christianity, as it is being preached to-day is an in- 
sult to the law of love and justice. He has made all 
into a common brotherhood and has given justice and 
equality to each one of us. John xv, 12-17. 

All of us must follow His example, for through 
Him the way leads to the Father. John xiv, 6, and 
as a proof that we find progress through Him alone, 
and that He leads the whole world, lie gives a com- 



THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF BEING. 163 

forter to those who receive His teachings and follow 
him in will, power, courage and love. To them he 
actually gives the Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, 
which the world cannot receive. John xiv, IT, 
Acts iv, 31. 

Without the comforter, the holy, invisible guide 
(see 73), everything would be mere theory, and could 
not be proven except as the logical conclusion of things 
happening every day. The comforter, however, does 
not admit any doubt. It is like the signature of the 
letter which proves the writer. 

God has taken care that the truths which were 
taught by Christ will be retained in their full signifi- 
cance. John xiv, 26, and xv, 26, and xvi, 7-16. 
Heaven and earth shall vanish but My word never. 

I admit that I would not have been able to write 
this book without the practical teachings of my high 
and holy spirit guide. 

[the end.] 



APPKNDIX 



CONTINUOUS REVELATION— BY KEV. N. SHULTZ, OF 

SAN ANTONIO. 

It was a narrow claim on the part of the Christ- 
ian Church, that the only revelation of God was con- 
tained within the limits of the Jewish Scriptures, 
when we see that He has revealed Himself to all na- 
tions and in every age. And yet, he has never given 
to any man or nation, all the truth, but to each only 
so much as they could comprehend. The savage 
conceived of God savagely — the civilized man thinks 
of Him intelligently. Never has man been without 



Hi I i \ 1 1 \\D justice; oh 

some revelation of God. Morever in every a ge He 
has revealed Himself in and through individuals in 
every increasing light. The great seers, poets and ar- 
tists, naturalists and scientists, inventors and discov- 
erers, reformers and martyrs have been the agents 
through whom God has progressively revealed him- 
self to the race. So long as man is imperfect, strug- 
gling, climbing — so long revelation must be imper- 
fect. It can grow only with the widening of man's 
views. 

Revelation must be supplemented by reason or it 
might lea'd to pandemonium. God revealed himself to 
Abraham and seemed to demand the sacrifice of his son, 
but without reason Abraham would have committed 
an insane-act. Joshua reducing the cities and people 
of Canaan, the crusaders slaughtering thousands of in- 
nocent Mohammedans, are illustrations of a kind of in- 
spiration without reason. No infallible or plenary in- 
spiration has been given from on high. Had it been 
the intention of the creator that man should have 
truth without effort on his part, why did he not give 
him at the beginning the steam engine, the printing 
press and the electric motor? Instead of that lie gave 
man ingenuity. He stowed away in the earth, coal 
and gas and oil and innumerable minerals. He planted 
timber in the forest and put rock in the quarries, and 
man putting this and that together, has built up that 
most wonderful structure called modern civilization. 

The Creator also endowed man with mental vision 
and surrounded him with mysteries to be solved. He 
gave man a heart to love and sorrow, and exposed him 
to pain and suffering, that through deep experience he 
might come to know and love; him better. Thus he 
leads us on and up. on to higher revelations and up to 
closer lib- with himself. 



INDEX. 
PART I. 

PAGE 

1. Creator and Master 

2. Soul and Brain 8 

3. "I" 10 

4. Justice to All 11 

5. Is God Just? 12 

6. Justice 13 

7. Meeting Again in the Future Existence 13 

8. The World After Death 14 

9. Christ 15 

10. First Condition to Progress 17 

11. Love IS 

12. Your Hand to Your Enemy 18 

13. Hatred and Love 20 

14. Re-incarnation — Progress 21 

45. Apprehension of Affinity the First Step Towards 

the Lost Paradise 21 

16. Everything Revealed 22 

17. The Guide 23 

18. Gifted with a Free Will 24 

19. Justice Created All Alike 25 

20. Evolution Through Experience 26 

21. Cause of Phrenology and Physiognomy 28 

22. Heredity of Resemblances 29 

PART II. 

23. Are Our Fates Justice? 31 

24. Re-incarnation a Truth 31 

25. Justice Leads All 32 

20. ••Chance' - — Boiler Explosion I 32 

27. "Chance" — Boiler Explosion II 33 

•Chance" •—Burned to Death 33 

29. Must Disappear 34 

30. Why Should Man be Just, and not God? 34 

31. Social Laws 35 

32. Capital Pnnishmenl 35 



166 INDI.X. 

PAGE 

:t.\. Necessity of Reformatories 38 

84. Shall the Criminal Escape His Penally - .' 38 

35. Cause of Form and Stature 41 

36. A Child of Misfortune 42 

Marriages arc Made in Heaven 1 1 

Unequal Distribution of Wealth 45 

39. Displeasure Over the Better Possessions of One's 

Neighbor 40 

40. Justice to the Usurer 49 

41. [s a Dark sky Pure and Eternal Joy? 50 

42. Not Eternal in Hell * 51 

48. True Means of Salvation 52 

44. Cause of Incarnation 53 

45. Expiation and Love Instead of Hatred— Brother- 

hood in the Work of Christ 57 

46. The End and the Judgment 58 

47. The Guides, the Natural Forces: The Johnstown 

Disaster 58 

48. Justice to Hardened Selfishness til 

4\). Terrors of Tradition 68 

50. How Divine the Work of Christ (14 

51. Spirit and Sleep 04 

52. Why the Former Fxistence is Unknown to Us 65 

58. Intelligent Chance 00 

54. Human Decisions Insufficient. All Demand Satis- 

faction 09 

55. All Are Related 72 

50. Laws of Fate and Justice 73 

57. Eternal Damnation 74 

58. Not Annihilation, But Improvement 75 

5!). The Humanity of Christ 78 

00. A Soldier as a Tool in the Hand of Justice 78 

01. Before the Jury 80 

02. Idiocy »7 

68. Created Arbitrarily or by Our Merit? 100 

64. Law Punishes Every Crime Against Nature 101 

65. Why? The Universal Fathers Answer 101 

66. Foundation of All Theories L02 

67. Expiation Purifies 102 

os. Higher Destiny LOS 

69. Apprehension of the Necessity Demands Ete-in car- 

nation '. 103 

70. Christ Teaches and Gives an Example of Re-incar- 

nation 104 

71. Mission of the Idiotic C'nl in No. 02 104 

72. The Stone of the Wise 105 



INDEX. 167 

PART III. 

PAGE 

78. Brother and Love 107 

74. Grace 112 

75. The ••Angel" 113 

76. Arrogance Must Fall 119 

77. My Creed 120 

78. Woe ? 120 

70. Repentance and Consolation 121 

80. How the New Existence Will Be 122 

81. Selfishness and the End of the World 122 

82. The Earth Sustained on Account of the Just 123 

83. A Brother to the Brother 125 

S4. No More Hunger and Want 125 

85. After the Fall of Selfishness . . . . : 120 

86. The Happiness of the Wise 126 

87. Let the Little Ones Come Unto me 127 

88. Ignorant and Infants After Death 127 

89. Experiences 128 

90. An Idea of God 129 

91. The Riddle of Life 130 

92. Cause of Birth of Idiots 131 

93. Fate of Children 131 

94. Laws 132 

95. Why Does the Child Suffer for the Mistakes of the 

'Parent? 133 

96. Cause and Cure of Disease 133 

07. Suffering According to Kind of Crime 134 

98. A Picture 134 

99. Children Raise Their Parents 135-6 

100. Gaston Melano 188 

101. The Child Carries the Cross of the Parent (No. 98). 143 

102. Mission of Children 145 

103. Modern Crimes 146 

104. Death of a Dear One 147 

105. Case of Life 147 

106. Mother at the Grave of a Child 147 

107. Children the Gifts of God 149 

108. Justice Demands Satisfaction 149 

109. Mars His Progress 150 

110. Illogical Escapes are Foolish L51 

111. Eternal Damnation and Help 151 

112. Childless Existence 152 

113. Conclusion About the Mortality of Children 152 

114. Paying Off 152 

115. Comprehension 158 



lC.S INDKX. 

P \-.i; 

I Hi. The Will 154 

117. Logical Purification from sin 155 

lis. What is Sin L55 

119. Fire Baptism L56 

120. ( Jan sins Be Forgiven? L5f 

L21. Christ, the Security 156 

L22. The Forces of Nature Led By the Hand of Justice. 157 

128. Preached Falsehoods 158 

124. Ingratitude 158 

125. Likewise a Modern Crime, or Ch bating One's Self. ]. r ><s 

126. Yon Will Seek Me, Bui Not Find Me. 159 

127. While Christ Has Taken the sins of the World 

CJpon Himself, But Can he Expiate the Same?. 160 

128. How Would Progress Be Without Universal Jus- 161 

tice 1(52 

129. Injury to Matter— Expiation in Matter 162 

lot), ('(inclusion: The Mission of Christ 162 

Appendix 163 



